


The Ice

by themantlingdark



Series: Mistakes and Accidents [1]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-09-13 18:20:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16897617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themantlingdark/pseuds/themantlingdark
Summary: The brothers navigate depression and a taboo relationship.





	The Ice

1 Boys

 

They're twins. Fraternal, obviously. Thor is nine minutes older.

In kindergarten everyone assumes they're cousins. Thor instantly corrects them, loudly asserting, “He's my brother.”

They look so unalike they could be from different planets. Odin is Norwegian and English. Frigga is Irish and German. Thor takes entirely after their father's side and Loki looks more like Frigga's parents than she does.

When they're little they have their own language. Thor won't speak anything else. Loki translates for him until Odin explains that, for Thor's sake, Loki will have to stop speaking this strange tongue in order to force Thor to learn English. Otherwise Thor will fall behind. Loki doesn't want his brother to fail, so he teaches him the right words.

When they're seven years old they wrangle Thor's bed into Loki's room. It's the smaller and darker of the two rooms, so they figure they might as well use it for sleeping. When they're older, they'll appreciate that it's colder, too, on the northwest corner of the house, and they'll both find they sleep better with cool air on their cheeks.

They move all their toys into Thor's old room and Loki condenses the clothes in his closet to clear space for Thor's things. They carry the drawers of Thor's dresser in one at a time with their reedy arms, elbows bruised and scabby from treating themselves too roughly - the imagined invincibility of childhood still holds them. They wrap the legs of the dresser's frame in old rags and roll up the rugs so they can glide the bulky thing across the hall and into Loki's room. They do the same with Loki's desk, sliding it into Thor's room, grateful for the smooth wood floors.

They didn't ask before they did it.

"They can't say 'no' if we don't ask," Loki had said, and Thor beamed, proud of his clever brother.

When Frigga comes in from the barn and finds them, hair stuck to their foreheads with sweat,  faces nervous, she smiles.

"You guys have been busy."

They nod.

"Come on. Let's get cleaned up for dinner," she says.

She lets them keep the rooms as they are and when she redecorates the living room she gives them the old couch and TV to put in Thor's former room. The couch is a treasure. A huge tufted thing with arms that curl around you. It exhales a delicious breath of leather and cotton when they throw their bodies down onto it.

They live in the middle of nowhere. The house belonged to Frigga's parents and they left it to her when they moved to Florida to escape the harsh winters of the Midwest. Odin works for NASA. Everyone asks if he's an astronaut. He isn't. He wanted to be, but he's blind in his right eye, so there was never any chance of that. He's an engineer, but these days he tends to do more community outreach, as he's a compelling speaker, and he's passionate about encouraging support for science in order to achieve a better understanding of the universe.

He's away often, visiting schools and businesses throughout the region, usually not for more than a night or two. He moved here from England in his mid twenties, and the boys have a hint of his accent.

Frigga goes back to working full time as an obstetrician at the hospital once the twins are old enough to stay home alone. She gives them the option of taking care of her horses and being paid for it, or she can hire someone to do it and they can keep their free time. They take the job. They like being with the horses, and they could use the money. They aren't old enough to drive, and even if they were, any other job they could find in their county would be at least a twenty minute trip one way. They'd spend all their income on gas.

Puberty hits them in ninth grade, bones stretching and aching, skin pulling tight, muscles coming unbidden. Loki begins to feel different. Not overnight, but gradually. Like dusk is descending and the trees are slowly blending into the darkening sky. His world dims. It feels natural. And it makes sense. Mortality has occurred to him. He's lost elderly relatives and pets now, and the reality that his own life will one day end has set in. Inevitable. Inescapable. Excruciating. The future stretches out in front of him. He can see Thor's path, bright and glowing and brilliant, shooting off like an eagle in front of his brother. But his own path is blank. Dark. Unwritten. There is an ocean of nothing out there waiting for him. He has already seen to the end.

He'll die.

Of old age at the very least, and he's supposed to believe that's a blessing, but he knows better. He doesn't think he can hold out that long anyway, nor can he see any reason to do so. But sometimes he lets himself hope that he's wrong. He hates himself for it afterward. For hopingeven when he knows he shouldn't. Hates being a prisoner to this nebulous and irrational sentiment.

Thor knows they're changing. And he can't complain - they had a long childhood. In a way, they've still got one foot in that door. Painting and drawing evolved out of play. Running cross country is a game that's evolving. They're not pretending that they're horses anymore. They don't have to pretend anything – now they really do escape. Their minds drift while their bodies focus on a task that's always different, and always the same. Their feet never take the same path – never hit the same patch of ground twice - but their strides have have the regularity of their heartbeats. Their minds float down the street, eyes, ears, and noses feasting on the sights, sounds, and scents that only come out at night; two strange owls coasting down deserted streets.

Still, Thor sees their toy soldiers abandoned in the sandbox mid-battle, half-submerged and spattered with mud from the rain, the plastic bleaching and going brittle in the sun, and he knows something has died. He thinks of the boxes of action figures, dinosaurs, and nerf guns in the playroom – which is what they dubbed Thor's old room – and can't pin down the day or the way those treasured objects became relics. But when he tries to envision playing with them now, he can't. He's lost it, like he lost the language he and his brother invented when they were toddlers. He's not sure what he has left to lose, and he's afraid to find out.

He sees the swing hanging from the oak tree in the backyard and can't recall the last time he used it.

He remembers the last time he saw Loki on it.

It was only a few weeks ago. Loki had gone running and got on the swing afterward to cool down. His long legs were bending tight up under him as he flew back and then straightening out and pulling him forward through the air while he leaned away, his thin arms extended to grip the chains at his sides. The branch had swallowed the metal years ago and grown around it. The swing was Frigga's before it was theirs.

Loki had been singing. He hadn't realized his voice would carry. Thor could hear him from the living room windows. He'd fallen asleep on the couch when it was light and he was lying there in the dark when he woke to music. He got up and looked around the house, seeing only vague shapes lit by the moon and stars. Odin was out of town. Frigga was working late. He followed the sound to the back door and stood watching as his brother flew back and forth like a caged bird.

The song was old. The Zombies, but not Time of the Season. Thor's mind sifts through the lyrics and quickly hits the title – The Way I Feel Inside. In his head he hears Loki singing it, not Colin Blunstone. Hears the way the words poured clearly out of Loki's lungs when he was swinging back, and how they were muffled - blown into his mouth and down onto his chest - as he sailed forward.

Now he wonders what made Loki choose that song. Wonders if his brother is in love. So much of the music Loki listens to centers on heartbreak. Thor aches to think of it. That Loki's love could be unrequited. That anyone could be foolish enough to reject such a gift.

In tenth grade Loki gets food poisoning from the cafeteria. He doesn't eat meat at school because he doesn't know where they get it, but it doesn't matter: the bacteria was in the salad greens. Half the school is out sick. It's on the local news.

Fucking typical, he thinks, disgusted. Thor hadn't eaten any, so he's fine. He got all the luck and all the looks, Loki laments.

The ensuing illness reinforces Loki's belief that his body is just a cage that tortures his mind with its inadequacies. That it's only there to prolong his misery. To limp his brain and heart from one injury to the next.

He spends five days shitting and vomiting, sometimes simultaneously, and nearly non-stop. He can't get more than an hour of sleep before he's up and running to the bathroom. By the third day he wants to jump out the attic window, but he figures with his luck he'd just break his neck, but survive, and make himself even more miserable. Make his body a more effective trap for his heart.

This is what we have to look forward to in life, he thinks. Being betrayed by our bodies. Watching from this reeking prison of skin as we fall apart. Being helpless to stop it. Becoming like babies. Having our asses wiped by strangers until death finally defeats the health care providers and grants us dignity, or at least peace. And that's only if we're lucky and we can afford it.

It occurs to him that, without money, old age would be even worse. He doesn't think he could ever afford to be old on his own. And there won't be anyone to help him. He'll be alone – he knows that much.

Thor is his shadow throughout this sickness, though Loki scolds him for it constantly.

“Thor, I'm gross, get out of here before you get sick, too,” Loki rasps.

Thor just shrugs, disinfects the light switches, faucets, and door knobs, and bleaches every inch of the bathroom. He brings Loki all the water and popsicles he can stand. Sits on the toilet lid while Loki takes a shower and demands that Loki talk to him throughout his bathing, afraid he'll faint and fall on the hard enamel. Loki swears at him in French the entire time, having decided to learn it when he fell in love with Albert Camus and wanted to read The Stranger without a translator interfering with the text.

Loki loses five pounds he didn't have to spare. His eyes are sunken and shadowed. Cheeks hollow. Thor goes out with Frigga and insists that she get more popsicles, because they're the only thing Loki can keep down. And he asks if there's a way to make Loki's diarrhea stop. She grabs some Imodium, and if Loki had treasure to give Thor and Frigga for these pills, he would hand it over gladly. He can finally rest. No more running to the toilet and sleeping on a pile of towels for fear he'll shit the bed. He passes out for sixteen hours.

Thor wakes at ten on Saturday morning and sits on his own bed, reading and staring across the room at Loki until he finally rises at four in the afternoon. Thor breathes a sigh of relief. The crickets are trilling the end of summer, but it's still warm.

They have all the windows open.

The curtains billow into the room in lazy waves and the breeze tickles their bare skin. Loki stares at the ceiling and enjoys a rare moment of mindlessness.

He stays there until he can't ignore his bladder any longer and then heaves himself up to trudge toward the door and head to the bathroom, swaying and weaving all the way. Thor is on his feet and at Loki's elbow before he can object.

“I'm fine,” Loki says, and Thor snorts and takes Loki's arm.

“The hell you are.”

Thor waits outside the bathroom door, smiling to himself when he hears Loki's groan of relief as his piss splashes into the toilet bowl. When Loki comes out, Thor puts his arm around his waist and helps him down the stairs for the first time in days. They curl up on the couch and watch Loki's favorite movies.

Thor inhales kettle corn while Loki carefully eats bananas and tapioca pudding, waiting to see if his stomach is able to the task.

It is.

Loki sighs happily, and shamelessly ogles Alain Delon in Le Samourai.

“Look at that shit,” Loki marvels. “It's insane.”

“He's so handsome it isn't even fair,” Thor agrees.

“Pfff, you should talk,” Loki gripes, and Thor throws popcorn at him.

After that they watch Moulin Rouge, which neither of them had expected to like when they first saw it, and both of them love madly. They don't even try to pretend they're not crying at the end anymore. Now they just laugh when the tears come.

“Goddammit,” Thor gasps, wiping his eyes. “Every fucking time.”

“I know,” Loki giggles. “It's not like we didn't know it was coming.”

“Shit,” Thor breathes, running his hands over his face and pulling a little elastic tie off of his wrist to put his hair up in a sloppy ponytail.

Loki reaches to demand a tie and then puts his hair up in a ballerina bun. He's sick of having it against his skin.

“Do you care if I do a Peter Weir marathon?” Loki asks.

Popcorn rains from Thor's lap as he gets up and grabs Picnic at Hanging Rock and Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World from Loki's shelf of dvds. He holds them up in his hands and raises an eyebrow in question. Loki nods.

“I was pretty sure you didn't mean Witness and Dead Poets Society,” Thor says.

Loki laughs.

“Young Harrison Ford singing Wonderful World is tempting, but no. I don't even own those.”

“We should watch Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom tomorrow.”

“Mmmm,” Loki agrees. “And Elvira Madigan is streaming. I need to watch that.”

“That's even sadder than Moulin Rouge, you fucking masochist,” Thor groans.

“Yeah, but it's soooo good. And gorgeous.”

Thor shakes his head.

“If we watch that we'll spend the rest of the day curled up in the fetal position, sobbing.”

“Yep,” Loki agrees. “But young Thommy Berggren.”

“He's like the anachronistic mpreg lovechild of Keanu Reeves and Alan Rickman,” Thor says.

Loki's eyes go wide and they both lose themselves to laughter.

“Oh my God," Loki gasps, between bouts of giggling. “Shut up. You're gonna make me shit myself. Literally.”

“Oh fuck, are you serious?”

“I don't even know,” Loki gasps. “No. I think I'm fine.”

“You should drink more water,” Thor says.

“I just ate a bucket of pudding. It's like gelled sugar-water.”

“Hummingbird sludge,” Thor nods, and Loki snorts.

Frigga comes back from the barn.

“Hi Mom,” they sing.

She leans over the back of the couch to kiss the tops of their heads.

“Feeling better?” she asks.

“Yeah,” Loki nods.

“Would you like me to make you some rice?”

“No, that's okay. Thanks, though. I'm full of pudding and bananas,” Loki says, patting his belly, and she smiles and kisses him again and watches the rest of Master and Commander with them before she joins Odin in his study to read, leaving them to watch Picnic on their own.

They spend Sunday the same way, only breaking from their movie marathon to tend to their chores in the barn. The horses are happy to see Loki, whinnying and trotting to the fence when they spot him coming. It makes Loki's heart flutter - this strange fondness from another species. He's only ever been kind to them, and they have always returned the favor. He had thought that feeding them was the key to their hearts, but Thor has been doing all the feeding lately, and they're crowding around Loki now even though he has no treats in his pockets.Sentimental weirdos, he thinks, and smiles and kisses them on the muzzles.

Thor does the heavy lifting while Loki brushes the horses.

Afterward they sit on the bench in front of the tack room and watch the bay – Selkie - and the grey – Puca – as they wander out into the pasture, swishing their tails and pestering each other with head-butts and nips.

“Shit,” Loki groans. “How much homework am I going to have to make up? Have you checked?”

“Yeah, you won't have any. Seriously half the school has been out sick. All week. We've just been watching movies and playing cards and reading. Mister Bertrand took us outside to do yoga on the front lawn and our asses got all wet from the dew. Stuff like that. No assignments. Even in Hoag's class.”

“No way,” Loki gasps. “I bet it's killing him. He has his classes planned down to the minute. You can hear the clock ticking in his brain.”

“I know. He looked totally constipated,” Thor says, and Loki giggles.

They never come out because they were never really in. Loki taught himself to draw by doing portraits of the male models in Frigga's fashion magazines. He did a life-size painting of Thin White Duke-era David Bowie and hung it on the back of their bedroom door. Thor has a smattering of little watercolors and gouaches pinned to the wall over his headboard. He nagged Loki to do them for him. They're all of Lee Pace. They whistle and hoot and groan their way through Chris Nolan's films.

“Look at those legs,” Thor sighs.

“He is poured into that suit,” Loki murmurs, eyes wide.

Odin watches Batman Begins with them. His only comment is, “God, he's a handsome kid,” during the scene when Christian Bale gets cleaned up and comes back to Wayne Enterprises.

They don't know much about their Dad's youth, but they suspect it's wilder than they could imagine. He has some crazy scars and he wasn't blind in his right eye when he was born. He doesn't go back to visit his family in England.

They never really get in trouble. They get perfect grades. They're both smart. Their friends are all sweet and laid back like they are. They're not sneaking off to parties, or tossing toilet paper into trees, or trying to get booze. Instead, they're up late watching Doctor Who and crying into their potato chips, or Thor, Sif, Volstagg, Fandral and Hogun play video games and board games while Loki draws portraits of them.

The only time Odin gets really upset with them comes when they go out jogging at night after a day of high winds and rain.

“You could have run across a downed line and been electrocuted,” he shouts, and they stand, mute and wide-eyed, while he yells. “You wereso lucky. A branch could have come down on you. You could have stepped in a puddle that had a live wire in one end of it. A thousand things could have gone wrong. Don't ever do that again, goddammit, you know better!”

They never do it again and that's that.

Thor finds it easy to get along with nearly everyone. For Loki it has been a struggle. He's always been self-conscious. He's always been compared to Thor and been found wanting by everyone but his parents and brother. It was worst at family reunions: Why don't you get more sun? When are you going to fill out like your brother? What are you doing for exercise? Why aren't you on the cross country team? What are you going to do in college? Thor's getting so handsome. You two look nothing alike. You must be a late bloomer. I still can't believe you're twins – you're like night and day.

They stop attending family reunions and none of them miss it.

Loki keeps to himself as much as he can. His teachers love him, and he is very fond of the good ones. He hates the bad ones for wasting his time. For making him come in from Frigga's lovely gardens and pastures to sit in the ugly classrooms that always smell of sweaty palms, chalk dust, and the combination of a dozen laundry detergents from everyone's clothes.

The only time school is a pleasant sensory experience is in math, though he hates the subject. Seats are assigned, and he sits behind Sevita Bhardwaj. He's been sitting near her in one class or another for a decade now. Her hair is long, thick, and blue-black, and when she tosses it with her beautifully tapered fingers he can smell saffron. He wants to shrink down to nearly nothing and tunnel into her tresses to sleep, hanging like the moon in the night sky. He could be happy like that for the rest of his life. She's always kind and quiet, smiling when she turns to pass a worksheet or a quiz back to him. He'd be safe with her. She remembers his birthday every year, and on Valentine's day he always brings her something: a stack of chocolate bars bound with red ribbon, a tin full of cookies he and Thor baked, giftcards to the movie theater.

Thor wishes his brother had more people to talk to. Once he suggested Loki could find people online who are into the books he likes. Into art. Into Ella Fitzgerald. But Loki said it would just be creepy old men pretending to be teenagers. That he didn't need to share these things. That he was happy to share them with their creators. That that's what he loves about music, art, and writing. That it speaks to people who never meet, over hundreds - or even thousands - of years and miles. Loki got Cave of Forgotten Dreams from Netflix and made Thor watch it with him to drive the point home.

Their differences grow more pronounced every day. Thor can feel Loki slipping away from him. Away from everything. Into some strange isolated silence and melancholy. But Loki is as warm with him as ever when they're together. They finish each other's sentences as they always have. Make the same jokes at the same time. Move through space as though they share one brain, Thor's hand reaching for the album Loki wants, Loki's bony finger's plucking the straw from Thor's hair when they're cleaning the barn.

But Thor catches Loki's face falling when he thinks no one can see him. Notices the way his smiles rarely engage his eyes. Notices how he pushes his food around his plate distractedly. How he reads all through lunch and only eats an apple. How his eyes are open, shining in the dark at all hours of the night. How everything he draws, paints, reads, listens to, and watches is centered on sorrow. He never gets to see Loki's writing, but he's willing to bet that it's sad too.

Summer vacation finally arrives and Loki brightens with it.

Odin and Frigga give them their old record collections and a turntable and the boys spend days sifting through it all, sorting the albums intoamazing, meh, and absolutely not piles.

Astral Weeks goes in the amazing pile.

“I kind of want to kill him for his shitty enunciation,” Loki gripes of Van Morrison.

“I know,” Thor laughs. “He sounds like Adam Sandler.”

Loki falls over laughing.

The season rushes by in a blur of running, swimming in the lake down the street, horseback riding, cleaning the barn, reading, painting, thrift-shopping, movie marathons, and music binges. Loki gets obsessed with Robyn. Thor dances shamelessly to half the tracks on Body Talk and Loki laughs so hard tears leak from his eyes and his neck feels cramped.

They race to the beach. Loki gallops down the dock and launches himself off the end, turning and treading water while he waits for Thor to catch up. Thor sprints down the rickety wooden platform, feet pounding, and leaps into the water. He jumps so far he seems to fly. His skin is gold with the sun, hair flying out around his face, limbs wound with muscle, moving with feline grace. He looks like a lion, Loki thinks. Or a Greek god. So, is he the ghost, or the darkness? Neither, Loki decides. He's Aether to my Erebos. Apollo to my Hermes.

They bounce a beach ball back and forth in the water for the rest of the afternoon and spy on the herons that creep through the cattails at the far side of the lake, snipping fish from the water with their scissor bills, like fussy editors.

August comes and the songs of crickets fill the air. The sound always saddens Loki - it means summer is on the wane.

School begins again, breaking their hearts when it halts their hedonistic routine. Loki feels bereft. Thor belongs to him in the summer; they're the only ones in the world. They float down the season like it's a stream, but it always pours them out into the ocean in Autumn, where they're swallowed up and separated by waves of strangers and acquaintances and schedules and assignments.

Loki stays inside, reading, writing, and drawing after his homework is finished. He leaves the house to take care of the horses, run errands, and go running. The latter he still does only at night, because he loves feeling like he has the whole world to himself... himself and Thor. Thor ran with him all summer.

The rabbits would dart out in front of them as they sprinted down the dirt roads and they'd laugh and shout, leaping over the cotton-tailed tricksters. It happened so often they both began to suspect that the rabbits were taunting them – not panicking, but actively trying to trip them.

Sometimes they'd startle a deer and watch its white tail bounce away into the woods or along the road ahead of them.

Loki misses his brother's footsteps tapping along with his own in the dark.

They still run together at night on weekends. On weekdays they drive to school in Odin's old Volvo station wagon, taking turns behind the wheel, alternating every other day to stay in practice. They can leave a little later if they drive, which gives them time to feed the horses. Then Loki can take the bus home in the afternoon, reading during the ride, while Thor keeps the car and drives back after cross country practices and meets.

Thor likes math and Loki likes literature. Not that either is bad in any subject. Thor writes air-tight essays and Loki can accurately complete equations. But Thor is frustrated by the imprecision of language – the way you can say one thing and mean the other - while Loki finds the rigidity of math boring. Loki sees no point in solving a problem that has a correct (and predictable) answer - in doing something that a machine can do. He doesn't want to do something that's been done a million times before.

Thor sees math as the language of the universe, and he wants to speak it. With English, Thor always feels like the words are twisting his meaning. That they're slippery and shifting and resisting him. That clarity eludes him. Loki loves that aspect of English. He sees it as a challenge, and he's always up to it. He wants to speak to the people on this planet... or one of them, anyway. And tell him very elaborately and explicitly what he thinks. He looks at writing, drawing and painting as the means by which he can get what's in his head out into the world. To explain himself. To forge connections.

They both love science, especially biology, and it's the only class they have together. They're lab partners, and their scores are perfect. Neither of them misses an answer on any test in the subject throughout their high school careers. Thor's electives are all in shop – he likes to take things apart and put them back together. Loki fills his schedule with film and art classes – he likes to dissect a maker's methods and see if he can apply them to his own expressions.

The brothers don't fight often, but when they do, it always comes to blows.

Thor will wrinkle Loki's good drawing paper, or dog-ear the page of one of his books, or he'll get nosy and look through Loki's sketchbook, and Loki will scream at him about being considerate and the importance of privacy and not ruining other people's things. Thor will say “It's juststuff, calm the fuck down,” and Loki will shout “It's my stuff, asshole!” Then Loki will grab Thor by an ear and a nipple and drag him out of the room, stuffing a chair under the doorknob to lock Thor out until he apologizes and promises he'll be more careful. Thor usually manages to keep his promise for at least two months.

On other occasions, Loki will enlist Thor to pose for a drawing assignment and Thor will gradually shift out of the original pose. Loki will carefully place Thor back into position about six times before his patience wears thin. Then he'll roughly shove Thor back into place, swearing under his breath all the while. Thor will point out that he is under no obligation to sit for this drawing and put up with this shit. Loki will tell Thor to fuck himself and then pull Thor's head back into the right spot by grabbing a fistful of his hair. It usually ends with Loki pinned face-down on the couch as Thor yanks his arms up behind his back until Loki is screaming. Then Thor sits on Loki, who thrashes angrily against the cushions until he tires himself out and starts laughing and apologizing. After which, the drawing is resumed.

Thor and Loki are sprawled across the bench on the front porch, gasping and sweating after their run on a Saturday night. The moths are fluttering around the porch light and landing on the screen of the kitchen window, casting their shadows on the brothers. Frigga comes out and perches on the arm of the bench.

“Hey Mom,” they pant.

“Mister Hunt stopped me at the mailbox today. He asked me about the two girls he sees coming over to the house every afternoon. What's going on, guys?” Frigga says.

Thor and Loki wrinkle their brows.

“Mom, we're gay,” Thor laughs, and then Loki's eyes go wide and he grins.

“Are these two girls tall and thin and flat-chested? With shoulder length hair? One blond and one black, by any chance?” Loki asks, and then the three of them double over laughing.

Mr. Hunt lives across the street and is in his eighties. He's very kind, and, it would seem, in need of a stronger prescription for his glasses.

Loki's biggest fear is that he isn't crazy. That he's right and normal. That everyone in the world has the same thoughts he has, and that he's just too weak to take it. But he's afraid to ask, because, if it turns out everyone isn't like him, then they'll know he's broken.

When his mind doesn't have something to occupy it, it turns against him, tearing itself to pieces.

Why am I still here?

What am I waiting for?

It hasn't gotten any better.

Nothing ever changes.

I'm just letting myself die slowly, too cowardly to take the shortcut.

I'm delaying the inevitable.

I should do it tonight.

But then it's two in the morning and he's on his back in bed, exhausted, and he doesn't want to hurt Thor.

Some tiny voice in his heart, like Scarlett O'Hara, muses that tomorrow is another day. Perhaps everything will change. Perhaps he'll wake a new man. Perhaps something will happen to make life worth the trouble. Perhaps the world will prove his pessimism wrong, and this tiny optimist inside his breast, who strings him along with morsels of happiness, will triumph somehow.

He hates the thought of going to his death without being kissed and loved. Without knowing the whole story. Without knowing what he'll be missing, and whether it might be enough to make him stay.

He hates that he'd never see Thor again. Never hear him laugh. Never see him grown. Thor's only going to get more beautiful. Loki can tell. Thor looks like David Bowie - if David Bowie had lived on sunshine and square meals instead of cigarettes and cocaine.

After midterms Loki's French teacher lends him an anthropology textbook, thinking he might enjoy it and knowing he's leagues ahead of everyone else in the class. She doesn't want him to be bored. And he loves the book, initially. But then he reads about the Westermarck effect hypothesis. The incest taboo. That children who are raised together don't normally have sexual feelings for each other. It's supposed to be an instinct. It's supposed to be repulsive.

Loki goes still and his heart beats frantically in his chest.

There's something wrong with me. Loki thinks. I'm a monster. This is why I can't see myself having a future. I'm not meant to. The sickness in my mind is here to stop the sickness in my heart. Nature found a way to weed me out.

It's late October. The sky is grey and cold and the leaves are wet and shuffle on the ground beneath Loki's feet on his way to the barn. They stick to the soles of his shoes and when they fall off they're stamped with the zig-zagging lines of his Adidas.

Thor is at a cross country meet. Loki does all the chores. Thor will be tired and ravenous when he gets home, having run himself ragged. Freshman year he had begged Loki to slather on sunblock and join the team with him. Loki can run farther and faster than Thor, but Loki said he needed the daylight for drawing and preferred to run at night anyway. And that was truth, but not all of it.

Loki hates that Thor doesn't mind running with the random collection of students on the team. That he isn't content to run quietly by Loki's side with the rabbits and raccoons every evening. That he needs to make it a race. Needs attention. Needs to win. Needs to be cheered. Needs to fit in. Needs to look good on a college application, as if a flimsy little file could ever hope to represent everything that is Thor. And Loki hates the thought of all those people clapping their hands on his brother to congratulate him, as though it's nothing extraordinary to touch him. As though some part of him is theirs.

Loki is quiet through dinner but tries to be himself. Something must show on his face, though, for Frigga looks at him long and hard at the table. Later, she leans in to ask if everything is alright while he's loading the dishwasher.

“Just tired,” Loki says, and it's only half a lie.

When Thor heads to bed that night, Loki is sitting up waiting for him, staring at his knees.

“Hey,” Thor says, rummaging through drawers and pulling on his pajama bottoms. “I thought you'd be drawing.”

“I think we should have our own rooms again,” Loki says, and Thor goes still.

“What? Why?”

“You should have privacy. I spend most of my nights in the other room drawing anyway, or reading in here. I know I wake you up.”

“See, I interpret that as meaning you should sleep more. You look exhausted. We're actually supposed to be getting, like, nine hours a night at this age. Minimum. You know that, right?”

How do you argue with a boulder? Loki wonders.

“Lock up your books, and your post-punk brit-pop shoe-gaze sad-sack catalog, and all your cool art shit, and get some fucking sleep,” Thor continues, flopping down onto his bed and sighing happily.

“You like my music. You're always putting it on your nano,” Loki grumbles.

Thor shrugs and turns onto his side.

“Go to sleep.”

“Thor, I'm serious, we should give each other more space. We're not kids anymore and-”

“Well I'm more serious,” Thor cuts in. “Shut up and get some sleep, ass-clown. You look like Edward Scissorhands.”

Loki sighs.

After that Loki pulls away as best he can. Tries to keep Thor at a safe distance from him. He spends all his time drawing in the other room. And reading and writing. He stops running.

The cross country season ends and Thor isn't as tired. He doesn't run at night either, seeing no point in going if Loki isn't there.

He invites their friends over, but Loki doesn't come in and draw them anymore.

As far as Thor can tell, Loki never sleeps. Thor wakes and sees his brother sitting there in the other bed, eyes reflecting the light from the tiny reading lamp he has clamped to the back cover of his book. Sometimes Thor can hear the floorboards creaking as Loki goes wandering around the house in the dark. If Loki isn't reading in bed or pacing downstairs he's in the other room writing and drawing. Thor can see the light under the door. He can hear Loki pissing at three in the morning. Hear Loki sobbing in the shower.

On Thanksgiving weekend it's four thirty, Saturday morning, when Loki finally climbs into bed. Thor can hear his brother's broken breathing. Hear the tears that have dripped down into his sinuses and are coming out his nose.

The bed creaks as Thor gets up and Loki freezes. Loki can feel his mattress sink behind him as Thor lies down and puts an arm around him.

“Did someone hurt you? Say something to you?” Thor whispers into Loki's wet hair.

Loki shakes his head no.

“What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“This isn't nothing. Something happened.”

“I was born like this.”

“Gay?”

“No. I mean, yeah, I'm gay, but it's not that.”

“What is it?”

Loki just shakes his head again.

“Loki, please.”

“It's okay, Thor. It's late. Go back to bed,” Loki says, feeling Thor's sigh ghosting over his shoulder.

And, for once, Thor listens, and Loki's bed feels too big and too cold.

And it isn't okay. And Loki still can't sleep. He spends all his free time not sleeping. He does his homework and chores and then goes to their room, puts his headphones on, and lies down in bed right after dinner. He rests there, trying to read for three hours, but rarely gets anywhere because it's for fun, and he just doesn't have it in him. He can do his homework without any issue because he'll get more attention if he fails to do so. Avoiding attention is his religion at the moment. He's a perfect student. He's quiet and prepared and polite and doing everything he can think of to cut smoothly through life, unnoticed.

Maybe it's the scant daylight, or the anxiety that always attends the season, but Christmas break is hard. Too hard. By the end of the second day, Loki realizes it isn't going to work. He can't hide from Thor when he doesn't have the excuse of homework to use as a wall between them.I'm out of time, Loki thinks. But I've dawdled long enough. It hasn't gotten any better.

A sound wakes Thor in the middle of the night, but he can't place it. He doesn't hear any movement in the house. He rolls over to see if it was just Loki coming back to bed after going to the bathroom. But Loki isn't in his bed. Thor listens again and hears nothing in the house. It's bright outside. Not from moonlight, but from the snow on the ground and the clouds in the sky, reflecting every particle of light for miles around. It's supposed to snow in the morning, and then off and on all day. If school were in session it would probably be canceled, and Thor thinks it's typical that the perfect snow-days only come on weekends and vacations. He can't remember the last time school was called off for the weather.

He sits up and when his left foot hits the floor it slides on a sheet of paper that wasn't there when he got in bed. He picks it up and flips on the bedside lamp, squinting in the light until his eyes adjust and he can finally distinguish the letters on the page.

Dear Thor,

I'm sorry to do this to you. I want you to know that I love you more than anything. That no one could wish for a better brother, and that all of the happiest moments in my life occurred in your company.

Please don't ever doubt that. Please don't blame yourself. This is about me, and what I need.

I'm so tired. And it hurts so much. It never stops. I just need peace. But it seems I've already used up my lifetime's ration of it. So I'm skipping to the end. I know it's cheating, but only a little. It's really not much time at all if you look at it as a fraction of thirteen billion years.

I'm going to swim out under the ice in the lake. Call the police when you read this and don't let Mom and Dad be the ones to find me. Tell them I'm sorry, and I love them, and I'm grateful to them for everything, and there's nothing they could have done.

And please be happy for me, and for yourself.

All my love,

Loki

Thor is down the stairs and in boots and out the door and running faster than he's ever run in his life. And it feels exactly like those nightmares where your legs might as well be moving through molasses. He fears he'll never get there. His chest burns and his tears are freezing at his temples where they've blown back.

He sees a dark figure on the lake and sprints toward it.

Loki doesn't hear him. He's raising a sledge hammer and crashing it down on the ice over and over, making a hole for himself to fall through.

Thor has never been happier to have had such an early – and bitterly cold - winter. The ice is nine inches thick. Loki hasn't even hit water yet.

“Loki?”

Loki stops swinging and goes still.

“Thor?”

“I need you to come home with me, hon,” Thor says.

He's speaking as softly as he can. Moving slowly. As if he's dealing with a wounded animal. Later he'll realize that he was.

“Can't you just leave me here and pretend you didn't see? Please?” Loki whispers.

Thor walks up and wraps his arms around his brother, taking the hammer from his frozen fingers.

“No, sweetheart,” Thor says.

Thor takes Loki's arm and they walk home in a daze. They slip into the garage and put the sledge hammer away, then come in through the entry off of the kitchen, quietly locking the door and putting their boots away. It occurs to Thor that the sound that woke him was the shutting of this door: the frame gets tight in cold weather and the door sticks. It's below their bedroom and it rattles the house a little bit, and Thor is grateful to the winter again: if it had been summer, the door wouldn't have made a sound.

They walk up the edge of the staircase, where the wood doesn't creak. They have to be careful not to brush against all the drawings and paintings that line the wall going up the steps. Frigga frames Loki's work whenever he'll part with it, and it's hanging in every room of the house.

When they make it to their room without a peep from their parents Loki counts that as his Christmas present.

Thor pulls his blankets back and takes the letter out from under them. Loki starts shaking and reaches for it.

“Thor,” Loki pleads.

Thor folds the note and puts it under his pillow.

“We can get rid of it in the morning if you want,” Thor says, and Loki nods gratefully, tears spilling down his cheeks.

“Put some dry pajamas on,” Thor murmurs, doing the same.

Loki obeys.

Thor takes the blankets off of Loki's bed and tosses them onto his own.

“Get in.” Thor says, and Loki climbs into the bed, lying on his side, facing the wall.

Thor slides in behind him and fluffs the blankets up all around them. His arm slips around Loki's waist and Loki realizes Thor is blocking him in so that he won't be able to leave without waking the crafty blond bastard.

Loki hears a strangled sound and feels his body shaking. It takes him a moment to realize his brother is crying behind him.

“Thor?”

“We have to get you help,” Thor chokes.

Loki turns around, eyes frantic, shaking his head.

“No, please, Thor. Don't tell anyone. I don't want anyone to know. It'll be on my records forever.”

“Loki you're just depressed. It's nothing to be ashamed of-”

“No, please,” Loki whispers, “It's more than that.”

“What is it?”

Loki shakes his head.

“Loki, you have to get help. You have to get better. If this happens again and I'm not there I won't be able to live with it.”

“Don't say that.”

“Don't you dare, you goddamn hypocrite,” Thor gasps. “If you think for one second that I can live without you, I'll tie your ass to a tree and I'll make you watch while I take that fucking swim you were planning.”

Loki's eyes go wide and fill with tears afresh and his head rocks from side to side on the bed. His face twists and he sobs.

“Oh fuck, Loki, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Shit. I don't want to hurt you. I know you're hurting already. Shhhh. I'm sorry, I didn't mean it,” Thor soothes, crying again.

“Do you hate me?”

“No!” Thor yelps. “I could never hate you. Do you understand me? I'm just sad and fucking terrified. If I hadn't woken up I wouldn't have a brother anymore.”

Thor's face crumples and he tugs Loki close and Loki can feel his brother's tears dripping onto the skin behind his right ear.

“We have to get you to a doctor, sweetie,” Thor says.

“No, please. We can find another way.”

“Loki, if we fuck it up, you die.”

“We won't. I won't do it again.”

“It's too much to risk,” Thor says, voice thick and damp.

“They'll want to talk to me and I can't tell them,” Loki says, and Thor leans back to look at him.

He pulls stray strands of hair off of Loki's face and tucks them behind his ear.

“Tell them what?” Thor whispers.

Loki shakes his head.

“Oh God,” Thor whispers, and his face twists. “Did somebody... Have you been... Is it sexual abuse?”

“No,” Loki says, and Thor goes limp with relief against him.

“I don't understand,” Thor says. “What is so awful? You're seventeen. What could you possibly have to say? Are you a serial killer?”

“No.”

“A bully?

“No.”

“Necrophile?”

“Gross. No.”

“A bank robber?”

“No.”

“Arsonist? Kidnapper? Drug dealer? Got a meth lab going in the barn? Do you have some epic overdue fees at the library?”

“No,” Loki says, a smile flickering briefly across his features.

“Then what's the big deal?”

“I can't tell you.”

“You tell me, or I'm dragging you into Mom and Dad's room by the hair and telling them everything.”

Loki sniffs and shakes his head.

“Thor... You'll hate me.”

“I won't.”

“You don't know that. It's definitely a risk. The odds that it would fuck everything up forever are high.”

“I promise I won't hate you,” Thor whispers.

“Promise you won't hit me, either.”

“Did you somehow blow my college fund on calls to a psychic hotline?” Thor teases, and Loki huffs a tiny laugh.

“I haven't really done anything.”

“Jesus, will you just fucking tell me already?”

“Promise,” Loki whispers.

“I promise I won't hit you,” Thor says, stroking Loki's hair back.

“Lie on your stomach and put your hands behind your head.”

“Loki.”

Loki looks like he's going to cry again. Thor winds his arms around him and shushes him, rubbing his shoulders.

“Now you have to promise you're not going to squish me like a python,” Loki murmurs, and Thor huffs.

“Tell me.”

Loki takes a deep breath and hugs his brother for what he assumes will be the last time he's allowed to do so. He kisses Thor on the cheek, sets his lips at the edge of Thor's ear, and squeezes his eyes shut tight.

“I'm in love with you,” Loki breathes, and he braces himself as he waits to be tossed from the bed, or shoved away, or for Thor to run out of the room to vomit.

“Is that why you've been so sad?” Thor asks.

Loki isn't expecting that.

“I, um... I don't... No, I don't think so. It's just the icing on the cake. I've been in love with you for as long as I can remember, but I didn't think about dying until ninth grade. And since then I haven't thought about much of anything else.”

“You've been suicidal for over two years?” Thor asks.

Loki nods.

“Jesus, Loki.”

Thor reaches behind himself to turn out the light and then tugs Loki close again, rubbing between his shoulder blades.

“Try to sleep,” Thor says. “I know you probably can't.”

Loki nods and disentangles himself and turns around to face the wall once more. Thor scoots forward and puts his arm around Loki's waist again.

“I'm not going anywhere,” Loki murmurs. “And you don't have to be nice to me.”

“Shhhh,” Thor whispers, and kisses the back of Loki's neck before flopping his head down on the pillow and letting a slow breath out into Loki's hair.

Loki feels like he just ran fifteen miles. He's exhausted. But he's weirdly calm. He feels light. He's been carrying these two weights for so long. These terrifying secrets. He had never kept anything important from Thor before this. It was like poison. Like lying all day, every day, for two years straight. Like being alone all that time. It feels like he just regained the use of a limb he hadn't realized he'd lost.

Thor stays up thinking long after he hears his brother's breathing even out and deepen into the pattern of sleep.

 

2 Reasons

 

It's bright in their room when they wake. The snow is bouncing the daylight off of the ground and up into their windows.

Loki stretches and yawns and Thor squeezes him.

“It snowed,” Thor mumbles.

“How much?”

“I can see six inches on the window sill.”

“Woulda been a snow day,” Loki slurs.

“Totally.”

They lie there for another hour, dozing and enjoying the warmth of the extra blankets and each other's bodies. It's like a furnace in Thor's bed, and it feels delicious contrasted with the cool air on their cheeks. Even Loki's toes feel warm, and that hardly ever happens this time of year.

Thor's stomach growls and he groans.

“We have to go dig out the barn and feed the beasts,” Thor sighs.

“Fuck,” Loki grunts.

“We can take a nap when we get back.”

They climb out of bed.

Odin and Frigga are at work. They won't be off until tomorrow for Christmas Eve, and even then, their mom will probably be on call. They'll both have to go back to work on Thursday. Loki doesn't know how they can stand it.

Thor puts Loki's blankets back on his bed and then takes the letter out from under his pillow and hands it to his brother.

“Do you want to burn it, or tear it up and flush it down the toilet?” Thor asks.

“Burn it,” Loki says.

They get dressed and go downstairs.

On the kitchen counter they notice two empty bottles of champagne.

“Holy shit,” Thor says. “That's why they didn't wake up.”

“It was their anniversary,” Loki murmurs, remembering.

“Their anniversary is June twenty-first.”

“That's their wedding anniversary. They started dating December twenty-second.”

“Oh.”

Thor grabs a stainless steel saucepan and a box of matches and sets them by the back door. They they put their coats, boots, gloves, hats, and scarves on and trudge into the garage to get shovels, then slowly push the side door open through the snow. They wade around to the back of the house and clear off the steps.

Loki reaches in the door to grab the saucepan and then he burns the letter, setting the pot of crisp blackened paper back inside once it's done smoking.

The horses are glad to see them. They were getting anxious about their breakfast. Loki feeds them while Thor cleans up after them. Together they shovel off some of the paddock, concentrating on the area around the trough and the edge of the fence where the horses spend the most time.

Back at the house they shuck off all their layers and Thor makes breakfast while Loki washes the ashes of his suicide note down the kitchen sink, running the garbage disposal for good measure.

Thor bakes Loki's favorite scones and makes scrambled eggs with milk and a little cream in them the way Loki likes. He's watches them like a hawk to make sure they don't get overdone.

They eat in sleepy silence and Thor clears their plates and does the dishes.

“Come on,” Thor says, tossing his head and heading back upstairs.

Loki follows. Thor grabs a fleece blanket from the linen closet and he and Loki curl up under it on the couch in the playroom. They each lean back against one arm of the sofa and pile their legs up in the center.

Loki can feel Thor's toes wiggling nervously against his hip.

“I want you to start running again,” Thor says, and Loki nods.

“In the daylight. And I want you to try out for cross country-”

“Thor-”

“Because running is good for your brain,” Thor continues. “Exercise makes people happy, Loki. Runner's high is real. And sunlight makes people happy. And friends and teammates make people happy. And you're so fast. You're faster than me. I bet you're faster than Steve.”

“Yeah, but running in front of Steve would be stupid because then I couldn't stare at his ass,” Loki says.

“I know. I think that's why he's undefeated,” Thor adds, and they dissolve into laughter.

“We can still go running at night, too, if you want. We can run twice a day. Do you think it would help you sleep?”

“Maybe. I think eating helps me sleep,” Loki admits. “I just haven't had an appetite. I've been really tense and my stomach's always cramped.”

Thor nods.

“We could try yoga, or stretching, or breathing exercises or something to relax,” Thor says.

“Couldn't hurt,” Loki shrugs.

“I want you to promise me something,” Thor says.

Loki looks up at his brother's face. Thor is staring back at him, lower lip between his teeth, forehead in a heap. He looks exhausted. He looks like a grown man.

Christ, what have I done to him? Loki thinks.

“Promise me that if you feel that way again, you'll find me and tell me and we'll get through it - no matter where I am, or what time it is, or what I'm doing. You won't try to kill yourself again. And, if you can't find me, you'll call a hotline, okay? You won't just give up.”

Loki nods.

“Promise,” Thor pleads.

“I promise. I won't do it again, Thor. I swear.”

“Even if you're just a little low, tell me. Or if something's bothering you. Get it off your chest, all right?”

“I will,” Loki says. “And promise you'll tell me if it's too much for you. I can call a hotline if you need me to.”

“I will.”

Thor lets a breath flutter out of his lungs and gets up, wrapping the blanket around his shoulders and going back into their room. Loki follows him. It's only eleven in the morning. Thor sets the alarm on his phone for five pm so that, if they fall asleep, they have enough time to make spaghetti before their parents get home. He flops down on his back in his bed. Loki sits on his own bed and waits.

Thor pats the spot beside him until Loki occupies it and then Thor flaps the blanket into the air and lets it drift down to cover them.

“How did it start?” Thor asks.

“I'm not sure,” Loki shrugs. “It wasn't like a light switch. It sort of snuck up on me. Like I grew into it and thought it was just a part of getting older. I thought maybe everyone felt this way. Haven't you ever wanted to do it?”

“When Grampy died, I wanted to die,” Thor admits. “But I didn't want to do it myself. I just wanted to disappear. I wanted the universe to take care of it for me or something.”

“Mmmm,” Loki murmurs, nodding.

“What did you want to get away from?” Thor asks.

“Life,” Loki shrugs. “Shakespeare must have been in the same boat: it's exactly like Hamlet's soliloquy. I'm going to die no matter what, so why wait? Why sit here and ache for seventy years just to delay death. Why not skip the hurting and get it over with?”

“What hurts?”

“Everything,” Loki says, huffing a bitter laugh. “Knowing we're all going to die. Getting sick. Getting older. Watching everyone I love get older. Being reduced to a social security number and health insurance number and student id number and being shuffled through life like a cow through a slaughterhouse. Being tiny and pointless. Watching everything beautiful die and rot. Watching Selkie and Puca running around and knowing they'll only get to live another dozen years if they're lucky. Looking at the stars.”

“What about the stars?” Thor asks.

“They're proof that I'm nothing. They're so huge, Thor. I'm as tiny to them as they are to me. I'll never reach them. Nothing I do will affect them. I'm stuck on this little planet running around like a hamster on a wheel. I'm not going to change the world, and, even if I did, it wouldn't matter. We'd all keep getting older and dying and treating each other like shit and the universe still wouldn't notice. It's always the same.”

Loki starts choking up and stops to breathe and swallow thickly.

“And even the good things - everything kind and soft and beautiful - only break my heart, because I know I can't save them. Everything is as doomed as I am,” Loki finishes.

Thor rolls over and puts his arm around Loki's waist and cries into Loki's shoulder. Loki rubs Thor's elbow.

“I think,” Thor chokes, before clearing his throat and trying again. “I think you have all the pieces, but you're reading them wrong. I think you've been looking at the world through... ash-colored glasses.”

“And you're going to tell me I should put on the rose-colored ones,” Loki sighs.

“Fuck no. God, that shit is annoying. Whenever I hear someone say 'Everything happens for a reason,' or 'God never closes a door without opening a window,' I want to punch them in the throat. I hate that crap. Nothing is that simple. Nothing is black and white. It's all just shades of grey. But your brain is lying to you. It's distorting everything. It's only letting you see one side of the story.”

“My brain is Fox News,” Loki deadpans, and they both snort.

“Holy shit,” Thor laughs. “Yes. And the ass-hats with rose-colored glasses are MSNBC.”

“And fucking HuffPo,” Loki giggles, and Thor falls apart with him.

“Exactly. Meanwhile reality is the BBC,” Thor finishes, and they both vibrate with laughter.

They settle down and dry their eyes and curl up face to face. Thor fingers the sleeve of Loki's shirt.

“And what does the BBC say?” Loki whispers.

Thor thinks for a bit, playing with the drawstrings of Loki's hoodie, twirling them around his fingers.

“I think... if you made a to-do list for everyone, the first thing on it would be birth, and the last thing on it would be death, and both of those things would already be checked off. It's done. Mom did it for us. She made us and unmade us in the same moment. It's not our responsibility. We don't have to think about it. Our job is to fill in the middle of the list...”

Thor goes quiet and rolls his lips between his teeth for a minute. Loki stares at Thor's eyes, dark blue in the grey light of winter, and thinks, somewhat absurdly, of Elizabeth Taylor.

“The stars do tell us we're tiny,” Thor admits. “But that means our problems are tiny, too. And the universe doesn't care, but that just means we can never really fuck anything up. If we could annihilate this whole planet and the rest of the universe wouldn't even blink, then it'sdefinitely not going to notice if we fuck up our ACTs, or flunk out of college, or get a speeding ticket, or fart in the library...”

Loki laughs and butts his head against Thor's.

“And Selkie and Puca...” Thor starts, but his throat tightens up and he has to swallow and take a slow breath before he goes any further. “We're going to lose the ones we love. And it's going to hurt like hell, but that's because we loved them like hell. And that's just what it costs. And it's not fair... but no one ever said it was going to be fair. And the fact that the universe doesn't give a shit means that it's up to us to give a shit. And to give things meaning. And to be fair. And kind. And I'd miss you, goddammit. I'd notice if you were gone, Loki – I'd never do anything else.”

Loki closes his eyes and ducks his head and Thor puts his right hand over Loki's left one.

“If we both live long lives... into our sixties at least, but preferably into our eighties... then I'll have loved you for longer than I could ever miss you,” Thor murmurs. “And that's the game: wring as much joy as you can from a neutral, indifferent universe. Rob it blind.”

“You're not as dumb as you look,” Loki says after a minute. “Have you been reading Camus?” and Thor pinches the back of his arm.

“What happened at the end of October?” Thor asks, and Loki sighs.

“I read this French anthropology textbook Misses Hicks lent me... and it said kids who are raised together aren't supposed to feel the way I do. There's supposed to be some instinct against it. I always took the pharaohs who married their sisters as proof I wasn't alone... but then I found out they weren't raised together, so they don't count.”

Loki looks up at Thor and smiles sadly.

“I'm unnatural,” Loki says.

Thor shakes his head no.

“Nothing in this universe in unnatural,” Thor says. “Just like nothing is supernatural. It isn't possible. Everything is natural.”

“You sound like Carmilla,” Loki murmurs, a tiny smile curving his lips. “I'm an outlier, then,” Loki decides.

“That's fine,” Thor says. “It just means you're different. Unique. We already knew that.”

Loki laughs.

They lie there a minute and rest. Their eyes, minds, and hearts are exhausted and raw.

Loki's stomach gurgles palpably and Thor raises his eyebrows.

“Dad went grocery shopping unsupervised a few days ago and came back with a fuckton of ice cream sandwiches,” Thor says, and Loki's eyes go wide.

He shoots out of bed and is down the stairs before Thor can even get to his feet.

Thor hears a happy moan come from the kitchen and smiles to himself.

They eat two ice cream sandwiches each and suck the remnants of the chocolate cookies off of their fingertips.

“What do you want to do all afternoon?” Thor asks.

“Watch Immortals,” Loki says.

“You just want to stare at Henry Cavill.”

“Everyone wants to stare at Henry Cavill. I want to stare at Daniel Sharman.”

“That scene is so fucking amazing.”

“I'm glad you feel that way, because I'm gonna replay it about thirty times. Their heads liquify when he hits them with that hammer. And he's in a skirt. It's so fucking hot.”

“Pervert,” Thor says.

“The costumes are great,” Loki defends. “Eiko Ishioka was such a badass.”

“I know. Movies are going to suck without her.”

“We should watch Lawrence of Arabia again soon. I just read that the costumers made his robes with thinner and thinner fabric so that, by the end of the movie, it looks like a shroud or something. I've never even noticed and I've seen it eight times,” Loki says.

“I like his eyeliner,” Thor admits

“I like his everything,” Loki sighs, and Thor snorts.

Thor retrieves the blanket from the bedroom and they curl up on the couch to watch Immortals.

“I love how they get tired during the fights,” Thor murmurs.

“I know. You never see that in movies,” Loki agrees.

“That scream is the acme of Kellan Lutz's career,” Thor says, when Poseidon roars “Do it!”

“I'd be fine with that if I were him,” Loki nods.

When the film ends, they stretch and groan, jostling each other with knees and elbows.

“We've got a couple hours before we have to start dinner,” Thor says. “Anything you wanna do?”

“We should wrap Mom's Christmas present.”

Thor nods and they go upstairs and pull down the attic staircase. Thor climbs up and hands the giant bundle down to Loki. They got a box for it from the local grocery store.

The gift was Loki's idea, but he couldn't afford it on his own. He asked Thor and Odin if they'd want to go in on it, and they were enthusiastic. Neither of them had any ideas for what to get Frigga.

Loki found a gorgeous Hermès saddle on eBay. They had it delivered to Sif's house to be on the safe side. The saddle Frigga has been using is older than she is and is well on its way to becoming dangerous. Loki wants to polish the old one and hang it up somewhere for purely ornamental purposes.

They stuff the box with crumpled up newspapers and carefully position the saddle inside it. It takes an entire roll of wrapping paper to cover the box. They wrap their gifts for Odin: a bottle of Kelt cognac and one of Redbreast Irish whiskey. They had to send their mom out to get it for them, but she approved of their choices. Odin doesn't really collect anything. He likes reading, but he gets everything from amazon and reads it on his kindle or borrows books from the library so they're not taking up space in the house.

When they finish, they carry everything downstairs and put it under the tree. Technically, it's under the table. They always get a tiny tree in a pot for Christmas, hang whatever ornaments will fit on it, and then when Spring comes they plant it at the far edge of the back pasture, gradually building a wall of pines to shield the horses from the wind.

Thor puts on In Our Heads and they start dinner.

“Here, you chop the onions,” Thor says.

“Why me?” Loki gripes.

“Because you look like you've been crying.”

“It's gonna make my fingers stink.”

“Then don't put them in your nose,” Thor teases.

“Fine, I'll put 'em in yours, you douche.”

They stay up watching Love Actually with their parents after supper, which makes them want to watch Four Weddings and a Funeral. Odin and Frigga go to bed before they start Four Weddings, so they turn the movie up loud enough that they won't be able to hear any sounds from upstairs, because it's only nine pm and their parents didn't look tired.

They eat more ice cream sandwiches and laugh at how ridiculous nineties fashion was. They feel bad for Fiona and chuckle at all the obscenities being uttered by pretty English accents. Afterward, hearing no noises from the second floor, they declare it safe to venture upstairs and get ready for bed.

They've always treated the bathroom as communal between them. When they need privacy, they have a system. If Thor comes out of the shower and Loki isn't the bathroom, it means he's still in the bedroom jerking off. If Loki comes out of the shower and their bedroom door is closed, it means Thor hasn't finished yet. It's easy and it works.

Tonight, Loki moves to leave the bathroom when Thor comes in, and Thor grabs his wrist to stop him.

“Don't be a dumbass,” Thor says, so Loki follows his normal bedtime routine.

He brushes his teeth and flosses them while Thor takes the first shower. He's always quick about it and won't use all the hot water, whereas Loki will linger in there until the water runs cold. Loki gargles with mouthwash that burns his tongue and brushes his hair so it doesn't all go down the drain when he shampoos it. By the time he's done, Thor is tugging aside the curtain and climbing out of the claw-footed tub, dripping onto the bathmat and scrubbing his hair dry.

Thor listens carefully at the bathroom door to hear if Loki is crying in the shower, but he can't be certain.

He's on his back with his arms behind his head when Loki comes into their room and tugs his pajamas on. They're both too lazy to carry their pajamas into the bathroom with them or to carry their towels back to the bathroom from the bedroom, so they streak through the hall after their showers. A couple times a year Frigga gets an eyeful when she comes home from a late shift. The boys squeak and scramble away while she just laughs and says, “Oh, please,” or, “I've wiped that ass almost as many times as you have,” or, “You refused to wear clothes until you were five,” or, “I'm a doctor for God's sake.”

Loki lies down and Thor turns out the light. Five minute later Thor angles his head to spy on his brother.

Loki's eyes are open.

Shit, Thor thinks, though he isn't really surprised. He knew this wouldn't go away overnight, but he wants his brother to stop hurting. He's terrified that it might never go away. That Loki will be fighting to get out from under this shadow all his life. It twists Thor's heart.

“Can't sleep?” Thor whispers.

“This is always the hardest part of the day,” Loki says.

“How come?”

They both turn onto their sides to face each other across the gap between the beds.

“I don't have anything to focus on,” Loki explains. “I just wait to sleep. So my mind always falls into the same rut.”

Thor climbs out of bed and leans over, pulling Loki's blanket up and nudging him until he shifts back to make room. Thor climbs in and they lie there nose to nose.

“What rut?” Thor whispers and Loki sighs, breath rushing over Thor's lips, scented with mint.

“The one where I'm empty inside and I always will be and nothing's ever going to be good enough to outweigh all the bad.”

“You're not empty,” Thor says, “You're full of words and music and drawings. And ice cream sandwiches.”

Loki huffs.

“I'm scared I'll never find enough light to fill the darkness,” Loki whispers.

“What's wrong with darkness?” Thor asks, rubbing the bones of Loki's wrist. “All the things you love are beautiful, and most of them came from dark places.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, The Cure and The Smiths would be garbage if Robert Smith and Morrissey were happy guys. Keats probably wouldn't have gotten anywhere if he hadn't had one of the shittiest lives in history. Imagine if Francis Bacon had been like Jeff Koons,” Thor says, and Loki has to stuff his face into his pillow to smother his laughter.

Thor rubs Loki's arm and kisses the tip of his nose.

“Try to remember the lyrics to every song from Ziggy Stardust, in order,” Thor assigns, and then slips back into his own bed.

Loki makes it to the fourth line of Starman before he falls asleep.

 

3 Drafts

 

When Loki wakes he sees a gold hair lying on his pillow, like money from the tooth fairy. He thinks of the thousand little intimacies of life in this house. The blond strands that criss-cross his own in his hairbrush because Thor never bothered to buy one for himself. The bars of soap at the sink and in the shower, wet and worn smooth from swirling between his family's fingers. The little dust-bunnies of pubic hair that gather in the corners of the bedroom - a jumble of light brown and jet black curls - when they've gone too long without vacuuming. The communal underwear and sock drawer in the top of their dresser – they're both the same size below the ribs and it's impossible to tell underpants apart without writing your name in them, which they refuse to do. The shared stick of deodorant, making he and Thor smell alike. Things that would probably disgust him in any other context, but here they fill him with sentiment and make him feel at home. He is woven into the bones of this house. His shed skin slipping between the floorboards. His fingerprints smudging the walls. His hands rubbing the wood of the railing smooth. His feet wearing down the centers of all the stairs. His height and age marked in pencil alongside Thor's on the back of the door to Odin's study.

“What has eight legs and wants its breakfast?” Thor sings from beneath his blankets.

“The fucking barn-beast,” Loki sighs.

They drag themselves out of their beds and tug on jeans and socks and hoodies before stumbling downstairs, bundling up, and heading out to see the horses. Loki gives them extra apples because it's Christmas eve, and because they love them, and because they get to eat a little more when it's cold to make up for the extra energy they burn staying warm.

When they come back, Odin and Frigga are awake and making breakfast. They all spend the day cooking. Odin got a turkey from a neighbor who raises them. Loki likes knowing that the bird actually lived in the sun and chased bugs all its life, and that they aren't supporting some big shitty business like Butterball. They have a late dinner and bake cookies “for Santa,” eating the ones they dub imperfect as soon as they're cool enough to touch.

Eventually, all the cookies are found to have faults.

The food in their bellies knocks the brothers out as soon as their heads hit their pillows.

On Christmas morning they repeat their routine with the barn and breakfast and then sit down in the living room to open their presents.

The boys go to their stockings first.

Thor has stuffed Loki's full of skittles, gummy worms, and reese's pieces.

Loki has packed Thor's full of animal crackers and kit kat bars.

Frigga loves the saddle, and Odin and Thor clap Loki on the back and tell her it was his idea.

“That's why he's my favorite,” she teases, and Thor and Odin pretend to cry.

Odin hums happily when he opens his bottles and winks at them with his good eye.

Loki opens his gifts from Thor and gasps: an assortment of M. Graham watercolors, Arches paper – some hot press, some cold press - and sable brushes.

“Oh my God,” Loki says. “These are so nice I'm going to be afraid to use them. Thank you so much.”

Thor grins and opens his gifts from Loki.

He unwraps a revised edition of The Celluloid Closet.

“Oooo! I've always wanted this,” Thor says.

“I know," Loki laughs.

Then there's the first issue of a year long subscription to Architectural Digest.

“Yesssss!” Thor hisses.

And, finally, there's an immaculate, fully functioning copy of Edward Gorey's pop-up book, The Dwindling Party.

“Ho-lee shit,” Thor breathes. “Where did you find this?”

“I scoured the internet,” Loki smiles.

“Thank you,” Thor says, beaming.

The boys have one box from their parents, addressed to both of them.

They peel away the paper and shimmy off the top of the box. It's full of the outrageously expensive running socks they love – and need, because they're the only way the brothers can avoid blisters with all the miles they log. On top of the heap of socks are two business envelopes, one for each of them. They coordinate the opening of these.

“Oh my God,” and, “No way,” the boys gasp, and they hear the camera clicking as Odin takes pictures of them.

The pages inside are bank statements, and the balance in each account is six figures.

“It's for college,” Odin explains. “But we wanted to let you know about it now so that you don't rule anything out when you're looking into schools.”

Thor and Loki are crying, tears dripping into their gaping, grinning mouths.

“When? How?” the boys ask.

They had always known they had college funds, but they were picturing a few thousand dollars in the accounts. Enough to help with living expenses their first year.

“Grampy started them for you when I told him I was pregnant,” Frigga says. “And your dad invested in gold a long time ago and made a killing. We put some in CDs back when the rates were good. The house is paid for. I'm a doctor. Dad works for NASA. There aren't any good restaurants around here...”

They giggle.

“Thank you,” Thor and Loki blubber.

They did all their cooking yesterday, so today they can be lazy. They graze on leftovers and play with their presents and watch A Claymation Christmas Celebration, A Muppet Family Christmas, A Christmas Story, and Elf.

Odin makes punch and doesn't mention that he spiked it. Frigga finishes her drink and then sees the twins, rosy-cheeked and boneless on the couch, their cups empty on the coffee table in front of them.

“Odin!” She scolds.

“Don't drive anywhere tonight, boys,” Odin says, and their eyes go wide.

The punch had been so sweet and bubbly they hadn't noticed the alcohol.

The wine and rum in their blood sends them swiftly to sleep after their showers.

The house is silent when they wake. Their parents are back at work. They can't believe the holiday is over already. That the year is over. They lie in their beds, willing time to stand still. Eventually, their bladders demand attention and drag them from their sleep. Then the horses beckon.

They return from the barn and trudge to the kitchen to eat more leftovers for breakfast, then march straight back upstairs and flop down on their beds to nap until noon.

“Lunch?” Thor asks, and Loki nods.

They microwave turkey, gravy, and stuffing and cram it all between slices of bread.

“What should we do today?” Thor asks around a mouthful of sandwich.

“I wanna test out my presents,” Loki says. “The pigment intensity is supposed to be insane.”

Thor nods, brow furrowed.

“What?” Loki asks.

“I have another present for you,” Thor says.

“Did you forget where you hid it?” Loki teases.

“No,” Thor laughs.

Thor goes upstairs and turns on his laptop. Loki wanders in, eating gummy worms.

Thor logs into his email and then gets up from the desk.

“Here,” Thor says, motioning to the seat.

Loki sits and stares at Thor's inbox, then shrugs and looks at his brother.

“Go to my drafts folder.”

Loki does.

“Start at the bottom,” Thor adds, and curls up on the couch with his new book.

Draft saved on Wed, Feb 13, 2013 at 9:15 pm

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Dear Loki,

Happy Valentine's day. I know it's a cliché to write this now, but it's a motive, too, and I guess I need one because I've been meaning to tell you this for ages. I know everyone thinks it's cool to hate this holiday now and claim it's all commercial, but I still like it. I wish there were more like this one. It's not like there's an excess of occasions that encourage people to be nice to each other and say they love each other, and I don't see how it could be a bad thing if there were.

I never tell you, and I know I should, because I do.

And I never just hug you.

I pinch you and nudge you and sit next to you and shove you, but I hardly ever hold you. And I haven't kissed you in years.

And it isn't that I don't want to.

It's all I want. And, if I could, I'd never stop. And it scares me, because it might scare you. But the older I get and the longer I go without it, the more I want it, and the harder it gets to ignore it.

You come back from your shower every night like you always have, but I can't look at you anymore. It feels like I'm stealing from you. Taking things that belong to you.

I used to believe we belonged to each other – I knew it. I took it for granted. And it's selfish, but I still hope it's true.

I'm yours. I know that much, but I don't know if you want me to be.

I see you hunched over your books and your drawings and I want to haul you out of your seat, drag you down on top of me on the couch, rub your shoulders until they're loose, and kiss your pretty neck.

I want to curl up with you at night and sleep in your bed.

Or not sleep.

I want to kiss your adam's apple.

I want to taste all of your skin. I want to do it right after you've had a shower. And then I want to do it again after you wake up in the morning. And again after you've been swimming. And then after you run six miles.

I want to taste your come.

I want you to put it all over me.

I want to get down on my knees and suck your cock.

I want to make out with you on the couch.

I want to hold your hand under the blanket while we watch movies.

I want to take a shower with you and touch you when you're all slippery from soap.

I want to know everything about you.

I'm so sorry if this hurts you. That's the last thing I want. I can move into the other room if you like, or we can pretend I never said this and I can stop being a selfish idiot and we can laugh about it when we're old. Or you can tell Mom and Dad and they can deal with me. Or you can use it to blackmail me into cleaning up all the shit in the barn while you just feed the horses so they can make more shit for me to shovel. Whatever you need.

I love you.

Draft saved on Fri, Jun 14, 2013 at 10:27 pm

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Dear Loki,

I've been waiting nine months for this... and sixteen years. It's June and we have a car. Can you fucking believe this shit?

I'm so excited for summer I don't even have words for it.

And I'm scared to ruin it. Afraid to ruin all the summers that came before this one and all the ones that come after. I've been wanting to tell you for so long. But the way you smiled at me today in the lake made me think maybe you already know. You've always been smarter and faster than me.

But maybe it was just my imagination... and ego... and vanity... and selfishness.

Maybe I think your smiles are brightest for me because I want them to be.

Maybe they seem to last longer because I'm watching them so closely.

Or maybe they are different, but it's just because you're so used to me. Because you let your guard down at home and you don't need to worry about what I think.

But sometimes I look at you and it seems like I could lean in and kiss you and it would be as easy as smiling at you. As easy as breathing. Like it wouldn't change anything. Like we'd just be saying hello in a language we've always known but never bothered to speak.

Draft saved on Sun, Sept 22, 2013 at 12:02 am

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Happy Birthday, little brother.

I wish I knew other twins so I could ask what it's like for them.

If they feel like they were made for each other. Like they belong to each other. Like there could never be anyone else more perfect for them than the boy they were born with. Like they're only half a person, but it doesn't hurt, because they were made with their match.

You're the only twin I know. Is this what it's like for you?

Draft saved on Fri, Oct 25, 2013 at 8:03 pm

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You looked like you'd seen a ghost all through dinner. Are you getting sick? Did something happen at school? Would you even tell me if it had?

Draft Saved on Mon, Dec 2, 2013 at 7:49 pm

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Loki, what's going on? I can hear you crying in the shower again. What the hell happened?

I never see you, and even when you're here you barely look at me. Did I say something stupid and piss you off? I didn't mean to, I promise. Please tell me what it is. I miss you so much.

Do I make you uncomfortable? Or angry? Or am I just being a self-absorbed asshole, thinking it's all about me somehow. Probably, huh? Sorry.

Loki logs out of Thor's e-mail account and sleeps the computer.

“Why didn't you tell me?” Loki asks.

“I didn't think you felt the same. I thought I'd lose you. Thought you'd be scared of me and hate me and I'd be taken away. And I was scared that, even if you did feel the same, if anyone found out they'd never leave us alone. They'd ruin it and hurt you.”

“So, all the same reasons I never told you,” Loki murmurs. “Why are you telling me now? It's still dangerous and terrifying, isn't it?”

“Not compared to losing you. Not compared to never telling you and regretting it for the rest of my life,” Thor says.

“What are we going to do?” Loki asks.

“I don't know. If mom and dad found out... I don't know what would happen. I think it would hurt them... I don't know. I'm not sure what they'd do.”

Loki nods.

“Are you okay?” Thor asks.

“Yeah. Just... stunned.”

Thor nods.

“When did you realize it?” Loki asks.

“It kinda... I mean, when we were little I always figured we'd just... be together... and I had these pictures in my head of both of us in wedding dresses-”

“Both of us in dresses?” Loki asks, smiling, and Thor nods, laughing.

“Yeah. I wanted to wear one because I thought it looked more dressed up and important. I always thought tuxedos looked too much like regular clothes. Nobody ever mistakes a wedding dress for anything else, ya know?”

Loki giggles and nods.

“And I figured if I wore one, you'd wear one... so... yeah.”

Loki moves to the couch and sits, leaning back against the arm and looking at Thor.

“It changed with puberty,” Thor says. “Especially after Mom gave us the talk.”

“I was so nervous that Dad was gonna be the one to do it,” Loki admits.

“I know,” Thor laughs. “But it's sort of her business, so it made sense.”

“Yeah. Thank God.”

They laugh again and Thor thinks for a while. Loki looks at the light bouncing off of Thor's hair from the window. It's purple. He wants to paint Thor like this.

“It was just... gradual...” Thor says. “And I didn't really notice it. I grew up with it. So, when I started thinking about sex, I thought about you, because... who the fuck else would I think about?”

“I know,” Loki murmurs.

“And I don't mean it like I was being lazy or settling or something,” Thor says in a rush, realizing what he just said could be misconstrued. “There just isn't anyone out there who makes me feel like you do. I'm not as close to anyone else. I don't think I could ever be closer to another person than I am to you. And you're so...”

Thor trails off and worries his lip.

“I'm so what?” Loki whispers.

“You're so hot,” Thor says, blushing and hiding behind his hair.

Loki slides down to lie against the back of the couch, stuffing his feet behind Thor's ass.

“Come here,” Loki says, patting the space in front of him.

Thor takes his phone out of the front pocket of his hoodie and checks the time. It's two pm. They have three hours before they should start dinner. He sets an alarm for two hours and forty-five minutes and lies down, facing his brother. Their feet brush together and their arms are all bunched up between their chests.

“Don't want to test out your paints?” Thor teases, and Loki snorts.

“Too distracted.”

Thor nods and hooks his calf behind Loki's. He puts his right arm under Loki's neck and his left around his ribs. Loki puts his right hand on Thor's waist and leaves his left bent up between them, fingers bunching the fabric of Thor's sweatshirt.

They stay like this until the alarm goes off, holding each other and napping. They get erections and ignore them. Hear all the funny little sounds of the gut as it goes about its business. Rub each other's shoulders and and trade Eskimo kisses.

They make quesadillas for dinner and afterward Loki finally takes his new art supplies for a test drive. He loves them. The colors are bright and clean. They remind him of Thor.

That night, when Loki can't sleep, Thor asks him to explain drawing to him. It makes Loki happy to think about it. To run through his favorite draftsmen in his mind. To dissect and diagram their techniques. To hear Thor's clever questions and comments and know that Thor is grasping what he's been told.

The rest of the their vacation will pass in much the same way.

The hours of the afternoon are spent on the couch, holding and stroking warm skin.

They move into their first kiss at a glacial pace, and linger there just as long. The wetness of it thrills them. The way they can get inside each other's bodies. Suck on each other. Demand each other.

They spend the weekend as they would any other. Loki draws and paints and watches movies. Thor reads and listens to music. They resume their ritual of running together.

The next week they set alarms and wake up relatively early – nine am – to take care of their chores. They have more time alone together this way, and they fill every minute of it.

By mid afternoon they both feel a sense of urgency. They know their parents will be home and they'll have to restrain themselves.

An hour into their kisses they're both panting and flushed. They arch their hips forward to erase the gap they've been leaving between them. The pressure makes them both dizzy. Things that could be mistaken for prayers are gasped into blushing ears. Narrow hips pump the way they were born to, and they come, trembling and whispering each other's names.

They grow more at ease each day, grow bolder. They work their hands up the backs of each other's shirts to feel the warmth of the ribs. Slide their fingers around to the front to tease each other's nipples. They both come in their pants without a touch to their pricks.

It's exhilarating to them to watch each other's faces as they tip over into orgasm. To hear the noises coming from the backs of their throats. To know they're not alone.

They slow dance with their shirts off and kiss each other's chests and stomachs, inhaling deeply to catch the scent of sex that's only inches from their chins.

They let their hands drop to palm each other's cocks through their pants and cry out loudly when they come.

They sit, shaking, in a nest of blankets and towels on the couch. They're both naked and staring, watching the fluid bead at the tips of their pricks. And then they're hesitantly reaching between each other's legs, stroking hot skin that all feels backwards, but no less perfect, and spurting hot streams up onto their pale chests. They swipe their fingers over each other's bellies and bring them to their lips, tasting each other.

“We taste the same,” Loki murmurs, and Thor nods and smiles, because of course they do.

They take turns sitting on the sofa like it's a throne, bowing between spread legs and worshiping each other's bodies. The first time they try this, Loki comes as soon as Thor's lips reach the base of his penis and Thor comes into the hand he has cupped in front of his cock, sending semen dribbling down over his balls and onto the floor.

When Loki's mouth touches the head of Thor's erection, Thor starts babbling and doesn't stop until his brother has sucked him dry.

That Spring, Loki starts practicing with the cross country team and Thor is right: it does feel good, and Loki is faster than Steve.

And Loki's right, too: it is a shame to run in front of Steve - the view is boring.

Summer is incredible. It's a hot one, and they're more than happy to have an excuse to be half naked all day. They jump in the lake after runs, skinny dipping, or turn on the hose at the back of the house and soak each other to the bone, squealing and yelping and cursing at the cold.

The days pass in a blur of swimming and sex and music and laughing.

Senior year passes in a blur of college applications, portfolio preparations, exams, and pestering teachers and coaches for letters of recommendation.

  
  


4 Distance

 

Thor gets into Case Western Reserve and Loki goes to MIT. Loki gets a generous scholarship but it doesn't make him feel any more secure. He's spent so much time listening to negative reactions from people – What are you going to do with a writing degree? How are you going to pay the bills? Are you planing to be a teacher?  He works himself to the bone. He tutors his peers, and gets a work-study job at the library. In the summer he works full time for one of his professors, helping her edit a book she's working on. He uses as little of his college fund as is possible, convinced he'll need it after he graduates.

Thor is studying Astronomy, but on the weekends he works for a local sculptor. He learned how to weld in shop classes in high school and he's strong enough to heave huge pieces of steel into place. He starts drawing and signs up for an art elective in his next semester.

The brothers have never been away from home before and it's exciting. The world feels bigger and stranger than they ever dreamed, and they love it.

They Skype and e-mail each other constantly.

They see each other for holidays and kiss frantically whenever they're alone. They go out running at night but don't spend much of it jogging: they just stumble into a neglected orchard and suck each other's cocks, leaning back against the trees, legs shaking, torrents of affection falling from their lips.

Years pass in a blur of work and longing, and graduation is upon them before they've even begun to feel finished. Still, Thor is so excited to be free he can barely hold still.

Their parents take them out to dinner in Cambridge to celebrate after Loki's commencement ceremony. Afterward the boys go to a bar they've read about while their parents head back to their hotel.

They order their cocktails and find a quiet corner to sit in.

“Cheers,” Thor says, and they clink their glasses together and make pleased hums through their first pulls on their drinks.

“What are we gonna do?” Thor grins.

Loki's jaw tightens briefly and he looks up at the lights while he speaks.

“I'm going to France for a while. And then Belgium and the British Isles. Siobhan's going to be starting another book at the end of the year and asked me to edit for her again. She has a friend in New York who thinks he might be able to use me, so I'll be apartment hunting there, I guess.”

“Congratulations,” Thor says, trying not to look too stunned or sound disappointed. He does want Loki to succeed and see the world and be happy.

“What will you do?” Loki asks.

“I, um... I hadn't decided on anything yet... I was waiting to see...” Thor's voice trails off into a murmur and he stares down into his drink. “Erik said he could use me again this summer... I guess I'll be taking him up on that. He offered to let me use his equipment after hours as long as I help with maintenance and buy my own steel and gas.”

“That'll be good. You'll be able to build a body of work. Won't have to put a studio together from scratch,” Loki says, draining his drink and ordering another.

Loki looks strained. Thor's getting nervous.

“Thor... We can't... I can't do this anymore. I've spent more time missing you than actually talking to you-”

“Yeah, but school's finished now. We can finally do what we want.”

“You can't make huge sculptures in a studio apartment in Brooklyn. Or a hostel in Montmartre.”

“We can make our own schedules-”

“Thor, it's a miracle we've made it this far without getting caught. We need to walk away before our luck runs out.”

“What's going on?” Thor whispers. “Did something happen?”

“No. Nothing's happened. That's just it. You haven't seen the world yet. You settled for the first thing you set eyes on. Everyone thinks people who marry their high school sweethearts are idiots, Thor. You'll be meeting all sorts of-”

“I'm not looking,” Thor gasps. “I'm already yours-”

“Well I'm mine. I'm not yours. I never was. I belong to me and I'm not letting you tie me up in this any longer.”

“Stop it. Please. Not here. I can't do thi-”

“Well I can. And I am,” Loki says flatly, setting bills on the table and leaving.

Thor goes to the men's room and vomits and wills himself not to cry. When he walks outside there's no sign of his brother. Loki doesn't answer his phone when Thor calls, and he doesn't answer his door when Thor knocks.

Thor gives a performance any actor would envy on the ride home with his parents. They never ask if he's all right. He smiles and chats and answers their questions about what he wants to do when he gets home, all the while frantically texting his brother. Asking if they can talkabout this. Asking what happened. Asking Loki to please call him.

Loki thinks he'll love traveling.

It isn't what he's expecting.

He feels like he's running, and he can't complain, because he knows it's exactly what he's doing. And he's himself inside, no matter where he goes. He can't escape his mind and his memories. Every broad set of shoulders stops him. Every blond head of hair. He's haunted. An atheist living in a world full of ghosts. It's almost funny to him.

He writes on trains and boats and buses. Absorbs slang and strange rhythms of speech in England, France, Belgium, Ireland, and Scotland.

He gets back to New York and works as an editor. In his free time he begins penning mystery novels that border on horror, and is lucky enough to get them published. He uses a pseudonym because he's senselessly embarrassed by them, but he has a great time writing them. The genre frees him up and the words come easily. He has more space to work with than he would in a poem, and the anonymity makes him playful. The books prove popular enough to be profitable and the income lets him breathe a bit more easily. He can spend more time on poetry and short stories that aren't quite as accessible or practical.

He still lives like he's a poor student. He has no car. No television. He cooks small simple meals. A weekly massage at a local spa is his only luxury. His apartment is tiny. There's a bathroom and a closet along one wall. A kitchen up front. The rest of the space is occupied by a twin bed and a desk with a good chair. The desk was salvaged from a street corner. It's as big as the bed. Loki can't decide if that's something he's proud of, or ashamed of. He has a laptop and a filing cabinet and a closet full of timeless and carefully maintained clothes. He writes obsessively, losing himself in worlds that are as unlike his own life as he can make them. Hiding in them.

But any time someone in his books or poems is beautiful, they have blond hair, gold skin, and blue eyes. And they're either the villain or the victim. Sometimes both.

When he needs a break, he goes to a park and sketches people and buildings.

He still runs, pounding down the pavement, startling pedestrians when he rounds corners, a column of black streaking through the city.

Thor sends him e-mails occasionally. Asking after him. Wishing him Happy Birthday. Congratulating him when his poetry is included in compilations. Telling him he still loves him. Misses him.

Loki deletes them all and then panics and rescues them from the trash and puts them in a folder he doesn't let himself open very often because when he does, he reads them over and over, speaking his responses to the screen, and nothing gets done that day.

Thor always asks him why, and Loki can't start down that road. He'll give Thor his real reasons and Thor's clever steel trap of a mind will shred them and Loki will be back where he started: endangering the one he loves just by loving him. Because no one will ever condone this. Where there's incest, there's a villain, and Loki knows Thor is no villain, so that leaves him, and that sounds about right. Because Thor is fearless and optimistic and perfect, and the world is vicious and dark and flawed, and Loki doesn't want Thor to know it. Because Loki is hard and hopeless and damaged, and he can't bear the thought of tarnishing Thor - of sullying him. Because it's for Thor's own good. For his safety. Because Loki is afraid. Because people are still beaten to death for loving each other. Because Loki loves Thor. 

After three years, Thor's emails stop. He doesn't even send one on their birthday. Loki isn't expecting it to hurt – he never responds to them, after all - but when the date turns over to September twenty-third at midnight and his inbox is still empty, and his phone never chimes with a text, he starts crying and doesn't stop until he falls asleep. Then he wakes up and starts again. He wonders if Thor met someone. Wonders how much it hurt Thor that he never once replied to any of his messages. Never came home to see him. That he invited Frigga and Odin to come and visit him, but never his brother. Thor doesn't even have his address.

People ask Loki out, but half the time they just want to ask about the recurring themes in his poetry. Why he writes about his god and his soul so much even though he's an atheist. And none of them really draw him in. And they're never his type. Their eyes are never blue enough. Their voices are never deep enough – they all sound weak. They don't get his jokes and references. Don't make him laugh.

A Lithographer, Svadilfari Hrimthurs, reads some of Loki's poetry and proposes a collaboration: he'll make prints to accompany four poems, and Loki will write poems to accompany four prints, and they'll publish them in a small run. Svadilfari is already fairly well known, and a gallery in which he regularly exhibits holds a two week show of the work, granting Loki's poetry more exposure. Loki mails a write up of the show to his mom.

**************

Thor goes back to Cleveland to work for Erik and he does begin making sculptures in his free time. He even sells them, to his amazement. Through college he filled his electives with art and art history electives and took advantage of the proximity of museums and theaters and lecturers to keep himself distracted when he missed his brother. He submits proposals for grants and applies for opportunities to install artwork in businesses and hospitals and his acceptance rate is impressive.

He sends texts to his brother, but they go unanswered.

Frigga hears from Loki and tells Thor about him from time to time, but Thor never asks her to, and wishes she wouldn't. He doesn't have the heart to tell her that. Thor only wants to know what Loki wants to tell him. He doesn't want to settle for his mother's charity.

One of Thor's sculptures is featured in Maison Française and then a flood of other interior design magazines want shots of his work. They find out he's gorgeous and include his photograph. Some of them do interviews and post little blurbs by his picture. Gallery owners catch on and he finds a few he likes to represent him.

Frigga mentions that a house Thor always loved not too far from them is for sale. It's old, but sturdy, with high ceilings and wood floors and lots of windows. There's a pole barn Thor could use for a studio.

He buys the house.

He lifts weights to help him heft steel more easily. His arms and shoulders fill in and force him to buy bigger shirts. The lines in his forehead and cheeks no longer vanish while he sleeps. He doesn't blush or giggle or waggle his eyebrows. Rarely shows his teeth when he smiles. His voice is as deep when he goes to bed as it is when he wakes. He can grow a full beard in a fortnight. His hair is thicker. Coarser. No longer the slippery gossamer that once floated around his face and lent his beauty a fragility that broke more hearts than he'll ever know. The last vestiges of boyhood have vanished from his form.

He still runs, finding peace in the stars at night and the familiar sights of the fluffy white rumps of rabbits and deer bouncing away from him through the dark. And it helps him sleep.

He takes care of Selkie and Puca for his mom, refusing her attempts to pay him. He wants to spend as much time with them as he can. They're in good shape for being in their mid-twenties, but they're getting grey at the muzzle, and he'll hate himself if he doesn't enjoy the years they have left to them. He can't bring himself to ride them, as heavy as he is, so he walks them like oversized dogs. Sometimes he takes them jogging with him if he wakes up earlier than he means to.

Odin has always dabbled in photography, and he helps Thor to document his artwork on the weekends. Odin's still working for NASA full time, still dreaming of Jupiter's moons, still encouraging young people to join him in doing so.

Thor visits a museum that gave him his first big commission: a sculpture that the visitors – children, mainly – would be allowed to touch. He's delighted to see that it's already being worn smooth by the strokes of their hands, gaining a patina from the oils in their skin. His favorite jobs have been the one's kids can touch. He has some other work at zoos throughout the country, also meant to be touched, and makes a note to visit the pieces and see how they're being changed by the touches of tiny fingers.

Men and women ask him out when he's in galleries and museums, but most of them look him up and down like he's a prize heifer, and ask, “Wanna get out of here?” or “Wanna come back to my place for a drink?”

One man asks if he can take Thor out for coffee some time. He's short and bright eyed and not remotely Thor's type, but the fact that he isn't ogling him or trying to make plans that involve the immediate removal of Thor's clothes makes Thor decide to go.

He has a nice time with Jack. He's funny and friendly and asks wonderful questions, and that makes Thor ask them in return. And Thor likes him so much he doesn't have the heart to lead him on at all. He tells Jack he's going back to Ohio in a few hours. But Jack knew he would be, so he isn't bothered. They exchange email addresses and end up being something like pen pals. Jack always has a joke for him, and Thor always has a book or movie or music recommendation.

He thinks of Jack as his first date. Coffee, a real smile, and a warm handshake. Lovely.

Thor starts making jewelry, which he never expected he'd do. It's unisex and painstakingly precise. The focus required to make the pieces to the specifications he sets for himself distracts him from the despair that gapes inside him. And he can sell the little gems for ludicrous amounts of money, though they take relatively little investment up front, and the shipping is wonderfully cheap compared to the freight costs for steel sculptures. They're more popular in Europe than the U.S., but somehow Thor expected that.

He fills his home with artwork. He trades for it as often as he can, not caring what the artist's experience level is, or if their work doesn't sell for as much as his does: a piece for a piece is fair in his book. He's partial to paintings because each one feels like it doubles the size of his home, no matter the dimensions of the canvas. It's always like he's getting another world that he can walk into.

He adopts a cat from a local animal shelter. He once read that black cats are the hardest to find homes for, and it pissed him off, so he made sure he got a black cat. Thor names him Snape. Frigga takes care of him when Thor travels, and she threatens to steal him, because he's easily the sweetest creature in existence, demanding attention, wanting to sit in your lap, wanting to be held, wanting to sleep by your feet. Thor says he's a puppy trapped in a cat's body.

Frigga shows Thor the write-up of Loki and Svadilfari's show. There's a picture of the two men at the opening, standing in the crowd and talking to each other enthusiastically, hands blurred in gestures, lips dark with wine, eyes shining. Thor hasn't heard from Loki in five and a half years. He tries not to let his mom see how much it hurts him when she mentions his brother. If he fails, she doesn't mention it.

Thor goes out running to clear his head and tire his heart so he can sleep well that night. He can see fireworks bursting over distant houses at midnight and realizes he forgot it's New Year's Eve. He laughs at himself. Time seems strangely fluid and arbitrary to him as the years go by.

Some time earlier that day, a driver had grown tired of his drink and rolled down his window to jettison the liquid. It froze to the street. It's been a dry winter, so Thor isn't expecting the ice, and can't see it in the dark. His left foot flies out from under him and his head hits the pavement, knocking him unconscious. It's two hours before anyone passes by. They call 911 and an ambulance comes ten minutes later. Thor wasn't dressed very warmly, since the exercise keeps him warm on his runs, so he has moderate hypothermia. He's miles from his house. He doesn't have ID on him. He does have his phone strapped to his arm. He was listening to music with it and it survived his fall. The first number on it says “Home,” but no one answers, so the EMTs leave a message. The second number says “Mom&Dad.” Odin picks up.

 

5 Home

 

Thor is restrained when his parents get to the hospital. The hypothermia left him disoriented, irrational, and uncooperative. He kept undressing, so they strapped him to the bed. He feels like himself again now, but he hasn't bothered to complain about the bindings. He suspects the doctors and nurses feel better with him tied up, and it's no skin off his nose. It keeps him from dislodging the hot water bottles nestled in his armpits and groin.

His fingers and toes are all intact. There's a tiny shaved patch at the back of his head and he has three stitches where the frozen ground split his scalp. There's still no color in his face, but he feels good. The doctors want to watch him for a few more hours, since the heart can do strange things in cases like this.

His parents look worried. He tells them to go home and get some sleep. They laugh and they don't go anywhere.

At nine in the morning Odin and Frigga are drinking coffee from a cafe down the street and chatting with Thor. When the door opens they're expecting a nurse, and Thor's going to ask him or her to untie him, because he would dearly love to piss in a toilet and stretch his legs, but instead he sees his brother.

Thor makes a noise like he's been struck, and he turns his head to lock eyes with his mother. His hand strains in its strap to reach for her hand.

She gives it to him, and he notices that she looks as surprised as he does. Odin, too. So they didn't call Loki.

Thor's pulse climbs so high so fast an alarm goes off on his monitor.

“I'll wait outside,” Loki says, and slips from the room.

He sits in one of the ancient chairs at the end of the hall and drinks the coffee from the vending machine there. Its flavor reminds him of salami. He stares at the ugly pattern on the carpet and tries to will his legs to stop shaking, but they refuse. He sees a cluster of medical staff fluttering into his brother's room. His stomach feels like it's full of centipedes and billiard balls.

Thor is stable and his family goes back home to take care of the horses, rest, shower, change their clothes, and eat a proper meal.

They come back later with fresh clothes for Thor. They drive two cars, though they're uncertain of what they'll do with them.

The doctor clears Thor to go at four pm. Loki volunteers to take him home and Thor doesn't want to inconvenience his parents. He tells them to go get some sleep so they don't have to miss more work tomorrow and thanks them and kisses them goodbye.

Thor stares silently out the window while Loki drives him home in Odin's car.

The cat is mewling loudly at the door when they arrive, though Frigga remembered to stop and feed him this morning after they left the hospital.

“Snape,” Thor coos. “I'm sorry buddy. I know.”

Thor can't yet bend at the waist as he normally would: his head throbs if it drops below his heart. He kneels and takes off his shoes, then scoops the cat up and drapes him over his right shoulder like the furry little rag doll he is, kneading and stroking him. He turns on his laptop to see if any orders came in and to e-mail a customer to let her know her commission might be delayed by a day or two thanks to his accident. He knows she won't care - it's nothing urgent - but he likes to keep people posted.

Thor leaves to wash the stale sweat of last night's run and the scent of the hospital out of his hair and skin.

Loki stares at the kitchen. Recycled wood. Butcher block counter tops. Huge oven. The dish strainer sitting by the sink fills Loki with a strange mix of relief and sadness. One plate, one bowl, one glass, one fork, and one knife are resting in it. One person living here. Sleeping here. But that means Thor is alone, which is incomprehensible and tragic.

And Loki's number is still the first in Thor's phone. It warms his heart, though he knows he doesn't deserve it.

He slices fruit, scrambles eggs, and butters toast while Snape weaves in and out of his legs unhelpfully.

Thor comes back out in jeans and a heavy sweater, even though he wanted to put on pajamas. But he doesn't feel safe being soft and sleepy and exposed around his brother. It's bad enough that he has to deal with Loki while he has a head injury. He needs all the help he can get. Needs armor.

Loki notices that Thor's wet hair and bare feet are the only intimacies he's going to be allowed. He wants to drop to his knees and kiss the knobs of his brother's ankles. Wants to bathe Thor's toes in tears. He suspects Thor would kick him in the face, but at this point Loki might welcome it. 

They sit down to their dinner of breakfast. Snape purrs under the table.

“It's a gorgeous house,” Loki says. “Just like we always guessed it would be.”

He's hoping Thor will offer a tour. He waited in the car with Odin when they came to feed the cat earlier this morning and he's kicking himself for it.

Thor only nods. They used to come past this place on long runs and stare at it. It's one of the oldest homes in the area.

“I still can't believe no one snatched it up before I did,” Thor says. “I got lucky.”

“Your art collection is incredible.”

“More luck,” Thor agrees.

Thor's eyes follow the cat around the room. Eventually Snape jumps up on the table, which he isn't in the habit of doing. Thor cocks an eyebrow and Snape sits next to him, tail swishing across the wood. Thor leans over and they butt their heads together. Then the cat turns and dips a paw into Thor's water before pulling it out to lick the drops from his toes.

“Thanks, pal,” Thor sighs. “That's your glass now.”

Thor finishes his dinner and collects Loki's empty plate, washing them up and setting the two sets of dishes in the rack.

That looks better, Loki thinks.

“Do you need me to run any errands for you?” Loki asks. “You probably shouldn't drive for a day or two.”

“No thanks.”

“I'll be in town for a while if you do need anything,” Loki says, knowing Thor wants him to leave but feeling reluctant to move toward the door.

“If you could take care of Selkie and Puca while you're here, I'd appreciate it. That way I won't have to bend over or drive.”

“Sure,” Loki smiles.

Thor just nods. He hasn't looked Loki in the eye once yet, and Loki wants to linger until Thor does it. Grants him just this one entry.

“Thanks for the ride. And dinner,” Thor says, and opens the front door.

“You're welcome,” Loki says, giving up and following, stepping out onto the porch.

“Call if you want anything,” Loki adds, but he hears the door close behind him before he gets halfway through the sentence.

Loki lies awake all night in their childhood room. He's supposed to hear breathing, smell his brother, and feel that extra degree of warmth that Thor brought to this place. The space feels unbalanced without these things. He thinks about driving back to Thor's house, breaking in, climbing into his bed, and begging him to let him sleep there. But that would likely be upsetting for his brother, and he doesn't want to make Thor ill. Putting Thor into a panic at the hospital that morning shaved at least a year off of Loki's life.

Thor has already shed every tear, bled every drop, felt every ache, and thunk every thought that can be had about he and his brother. He sleeps the dreamless slumber of the dead and wakes to find the world still turning, just as it has every day since Loki left him. It feels like being mocked. But he's grown used to it. It stung at first. But now it's familiar. Thor supposes that's the first step toward a thing becoming comfortable.

In the morning, Loki feeds the horses and then calls Thor. He gets no answer. And he knows it's because Thor doesn't want to talk to him. But he has the excuse of Thor's health, and he has no qualms about using it.

He puts on his running gear and nearly sprints to his brother's house. He stands, gasping, on the porch for five minutes, waiting for his breathing to settle. There's no answer when he knocks and rings the bell, but Thor's truck is in the driveway. He walks around back to the barn and hears music.

There's a small door at the side and he opens it slowly, getting ready to shield his eyes if Thor is welding. The dreamy buzz of Under Your Spellswells around him and he silently shuts the door.

Thor is putting a finish on a piece and Loki can smell the beeswax and turpentine. He's had affection for these scents since he was a boy – honey in the comb and oil painting, two of his favorite things.

“Did you run here?” Thor says, not looking up, and Loki has no idea how Thor knows he's there.

“Yeah. I called but there was no answer.”

Thor doesn't say anything.

“Are you okay?” Loki asks.

“Yep.”

Loki sits on a stool and watches for three hours as Thor applies wax and buffs it over the metal, heating it occasionally to make it melt into the surface. He stares at Thor's right eyebrow. The arch always makes it look like Thor is angry, or wicked. Loki's right eyebrow always makes him look surprised. And sad.

Thor gets up to break for lunch and Loki follows him out.

“Do you want a ride home?” Thor asks, and Loki wants to cry.

“No.”

They go inside and Loki sits and stares while Thor scrubs his hands.

“Why are you here?” Thor asks, and Loki jerks at the sound.

“You were in the hospital.”

Thor dries his hands and turns around and finally looks at Loki. And Loki can't stop himself in time – he smiles.

“What difference does that make?” Thor asks.

“You could have died.”

“I could die any day of the week. What do you care?”

“You're my brother.”

“I've been your brother for every second of the last five years, and as far as I can tell I've been as good as dead to you all that time. Am I only allowed to be dead on your terms? Is that it?”

Loki shakes his head no and gets up, starting toward Thor.

“Go home,” Thor says.

Loki keeps walking toward him, waiting to see if Thor will punch him, or push him away, or leave the room. But Thor acts the way he would if a deer wandered up to him in the woods. He just stands there, motionless, waiting to see what will happen.

Loki walks forward until his chest is flush against Thor's, drops his forehead to Thor's right shoulder, and takes a deep slow breath.

And the way Thor smells wrenches something loose inside him. Something he forgot existed. An Atlantis of sentiment.

This is home, Loki realizes. This scent, this temperature, the height of this shoulder, this person.

I ran away from home.

He presses his face into Thor's neck and wraps his arms around his waist. And it's foreign and familiar. Thor was never this big before. Loki feels pathetic in front of him. Feels as small as he believes he ought.

“Thor.”

“Don't like it when something you think is yours might get taken away?” Thor asks. “I hope the poetic justice isn't lost on you.”

“Thor, please.”

“Please what?”

Loki just squeezes Thor's waist a bit harder and Thor keeps standing there like he's dealing with a confused animal, arms loose at his sides, breath slow.

Then Loki kisses Thor's neck and Thor grabs Loki's arms, plucks them off his waist and slams them down against Loki's sides, sending Loki backwards a step in surprise.

“No,” Thor growls. “You don't get to do this to me again. I begged you to talk to me. For months – years - and you didn't say anything. Wouldn't part with so much as a fucking word. You only came by chance. You wouldn't be here if I hadn't had an accident. And I'm fine, so you can go back to not being here.”

“Did you think it was easy for me?” Loki gasps.

“Easy enough that you got it on your first try,” Thor says, walking away to stare out the front window.

“You're everything to me,” Loki says, and Thor spins.

“You're everything to you. Remember?”

“I didn't want you to get hurt.”

“Oh,” Thor chuckles. “I see. And your solution was to hurt me so badly nothing could ever hurt me again. Well done, then, Loki. That was very clever. Thank you. I'm in your debt.”

“I made a mistake,” Loki whispers.

“Well I hope you learned from it. I know I did,” Thor says, taking a plate out of a cupboard and a knife from a drawer.

He grabs bread, turkey, and mayo from the fridge and makes himself a sandwich. Grabs an apple from the bowl on the counter and takes a bite. He's gone back to withholding his gaze from Loki, and Loki wants to wave his arms in the air and stomp his feet and break things to get Thor's attention.

“I thought that once we got out into the world it would put things in perspective,” Loki explains.

“Hoped it would make me as small as you wanted me to be,” Thor says, nodding.

“Thor, someone could have found out. They could have hurt you,” Loki says, and Thor barks a laugh.

“So you decided to save them the trouble. Why wait for broken hearts that might never come when you can have one today? A bird in hand-”

“Don't say that.”

Loki can't bear the thought that Thor's heart is broken. That this is finished. That what's between them is dead. That he killed it. Ended a love that's as old as he is.

Thor washes his plate and heads for the door, but Loki grabs him again and Thor just stands there, patiently waiting for Loki to leave.

Loki jams his left hand under the waistline of Thor's jeans at the small of his back and weaves the fingers of his right hand into Thor's hair. He sucks the skin of Thor's neck into his mouth.

Thor shakes his head, peels Loki off, and continues toward the door.

“Thor, please,” Loki begs.

“Can't go more than a day without getting laid?” Thor asks, stepping into his boots. “Poor thing.”

“Two thousand fifty six days,” Loki says, and Thor goes still.

“Fuck you,” Thor breathes. “That isn't funny.”

“I know it isn't,” Loki whispers.

“Get out.”

“No.”

“Now,” Thor shouts.

And Loki leaves, just like Thor knew he would.

Thor goes back to his shop and puts the finishing touches on the piece. He takes measurements and starts building the crate to ship it in.

At ten o'clock that night, Thor is on the couch, reading a biography of J. M. W. Turner and feeling like an underachiever, when he hears footsteps on his front porch and keys jingling.

Fuck my life, Thor thinks, and wonders if he can run out the back door and get to his truck before his brother makes it through the locks.

He's glad he left his porch light off. Loki will have to use his phone for a flashlight.

Thor sighs and waits. He hears keys hitting the floor, followed by muffled cursing. Finally, the lock turns and the door opens.

Loki slips in and takes off his shoes. He locks the door behind him and hangs his track jacket on the hook. He sets his gloves and hat on the counter with the spare keys he probably stole from Frigga.

“How's your head?” Loki asks, perching on the edge of a chair opposite his brother.

“Fine.”

“Any trouble from the hypothermia?”

“Muscle aches. I'm sure half of it's from tensing when I slipped.”

“Take anything for it?”

“A hot bath.”

Loki already knows that much. The air in the house is sweet and warm and humid. Thor's hair is still damp. Loki is pleased to have caught Thor in his pajamas: a heathered grey v-neck t-shirt, worn through to near-transparency, and a pair of flannel pants in a red tartan. Loki has never seen anything more inviting or irresistible in his entire life. Thor reading on the couch in his PJs. Who'd have guessed.

“Jordan Boone?” Thor says.

“Jesus. Fuck. How the fuck do you know about that?” Loki gasps. “I haven't told anyone.”

Thor snorts.

“Your picture is on the dust jacket. And Dad is credited as the photographer. And your books are everywhere.”

Loki used an old shot when his publisher asked him for one. It's from senior year of high school. He's running. Smiling. Unrecognizable. Odin took it when Loki was almost at the finish line. There wasn't another runner near him for an eighth of a mile.

“Have you told anyone?” Loki asks.

“No.”

Loki nods, grateful.

“If you run home you'll have done a marathon today,” Thor says.

Loki doesn't want to run back to his parents' house.

“When I got here, I pictured you reaching through the door, grabbing me by the face, and sending me down flat onto my back,” Loki admits.

“The Philadelphia Story,” Thor laughs. “Well, the night is young.”

"I know I shouldn't laugh at that scene because it's spousal abuse,” Loki says, giggling. “But every time I see it, I lose my shit.”

“I know. It's perfect.”

Thor's book is still open on his lap. Loki wants to pick it up and drop it on the floor, hearing the slapping thud and feeling the air whoosh out from under it.

“How was work?” Loki asks, and Thor wants to scream.

Christ, he thinks. Small talk? Is he trying to torture me? And then it occurs to him that Loki has done nothing but torture him for over five years now, so why should today be any different?

“Fine,” Thor answers.

“I really must insist on the tour,” Loki says.

Thor sets his book on the coffee table and rises. Loki's pulse speeds up in triumph, cheering in his chest.

Thor walks to the kitchen and Loki follows.

He grabs Loki's things from the counter and sets them in Loki's hand, then takes Loki's elbow and walks him to the door.

“Put your shoes on,” he says, taking Loki's jacket down from the hook and holding it out for him.

Loki shakes his head no.

“Come on,” Thor coaxes, like he's speaking to a sleepy child.

“Why are you doing this?” Loki whispers.

“Self preservation,” Thor shrugs. “Wasn't that the whole point?”

Loki strides back into the kitchen and sets his things down again, then all but sprints through the living room and up the stairs.

Thor sighs and pours himself a glass of water and sinks back down onto the couch to finish the chapter Loki interrupted. Halfway through, he hears the water running upstairs and hopes it's the toilet flushing, but thirty seconds later it's still going, and he realizes it's the shower.

“Goddammit,” Thor says, and startles Snape from his nap.

He hears the pipes shudder to a halt and the floor creak under Loki's feet. He waits for footsteps on the stairs but never hears any.

Thor thinks about peeing in the back yard and sleeping on the couch.

Loki peeks into the guest room and spies a double bed. It looks cozy. He ignores it and walks across the hall. There's a king bed in this room. Pale grey linens. It smells like Thor in here. Thor's skin is always dry in the winter. Whatever lotion he's using for it smells of grapefruit. Feminine and bright. Pink and gold. Thor, Loki thinks, affectionately. Thor with long blond hair and Maybelline lashes. Thor who'd marry me in a wedding dress. Thor unconscious in the road in January. Thor with sutures in his scalp.

He climbs into the bed and presses a pillow to his face, burying his nose in the scent of his brother's neck.

Thor decides he's being ridiculous and won't be made to feel like a stranger in his own home. He scoops up the cat and heads upstairs. There's an extra towel hanging beside his own on the hook on the back of the bathroom door. Thor sees it in the mirror when he's brushing his teeth. He peeks in the guest room, hoping to find it occupied.

It isn't.

I'm not that lucky, Thor laments.

He flips the bedside lamp on in his own room and Loki startles, squinting at him, eyes watering from the shock of light. Snape hops onto the bed and curls up in his customary spot at the foot. Thor sits next to the cat.

He had hoped that his brother would at least have the decency to steal some pajamas to sleep in, but again, Thor is luckless. Loki's shoulders are bare above the sheet, pale and firm with black hair falling around them. His clothes are draped over a chair.

“What do you want?” Thor asks.

“Come to bed,” Loki murmurs.

“I can't.”

“Why not?” Loki asks, and Thor laughs.

“Are you serious? 'Why not?' Because I can't go through this again. I won't.”

“I'm not asking you to,” Loki says.

“Then what the hell are you asking?”

“Full pardon. Clean slate. Fresh start. I won't leave you.”

“And when do you go back to New York?”

“My flight to LaGuardia leaves tomorrow night.”

“Of course it does,” Thor laughs.

“But I'll come back.”

“Why?”

“You know why. And who's going to take those stitches out of your head?”

“Mom's a doctor,” Thor sighs. “Are you planning to come here just to fuss over me? You'll go out of your mind. There's still nothing here, Loki. No one for miles. You know what it's like. And I'm not leaving. I hate concrete. And why would this time be any different? Incest is still frowned upon, remember?”

“The laws in Ohio are rather lax,” Loki murmurs, and sits up, blankets pooling at his belly.

He takes a deep breath. 

“Thor... I made a mistake. I got it wrong. Got scared. Lost my nerve. I thought I was going to cost you your reputation. Your happiness. Yourlife. And instead I cost us five years.... and for nothing. It didn't keep you safer - you went and smashed your head open all on your own. I thought I'd lost you when I heard the message on my phone," Loki's voice breaks, and Thor wants to hold him, but he won't. "And all my fears seemed to warp in my mind. They were all so misplaced. And I realized that I had given you all the wounds I would have shielded you from. Made the world as ugly as I always thought it was. Lived a lie and let my mind convince me that my love for you was wrong. That I should hide it from you. Starve it out of us. And I'm sorry, Thor. I'm so, so sorry. I don't want to cost us any more time. Please.”

“There is no us, Loki.”

Loki stopped blinking several minutes ago, knowing it would push his tears over the brims and down his cheeks, but now his eyes are so full they well over on their own.

“Do you mean that?” Loki whispers.

“I don't have a choice.”

“You do.”

Thor doesn't. He never has.

“Scoot over,” Thor sighs, and Loki shuffles aside.

Thor lies down on his back and Loki gingerly inches toward him, lifting Thor's arm so that he can press his front to Thor's side. Resting his sniffling, tear-drenched head on Thor's shoulder. Putting his palm over Thor's ribs and rubbing his chest through the thin fabric of his t-shirt.

“I'll come back, Thor, I promise,” Loki whispers.

Thor won't hold his breath. He's going to tell himself this is a dream. A gift.

He looks to his side and catches Loki's eyes and Loki smiles and tugs the front of Thor's shirt and Thor rolls to face him. Loki's cheeks are wet with tears and lifted in a grin. This is how his portrait should be taken. Loki has long had one foot in sunlight and the other in shadow.

And Thor thinks he should have known Loki's sorrow had been getting the better of him. Should have gone to New York and pulled this poison out of him. But his pride wouldn't let him. He didn't want to have to work for this. He thought it should be effortless. Because that's how it is for him: loving Loki is easy. But Loki is different. He'd seemed to be doing so well for so long, Thor thought the shadow had passed. That it had faded with the other blemishes of adolescence. But it was just dormant. First it tried to take Loki's life. Then it tried to take his love. Thor can't imagine what else it could cost, so he's going to have to ask.

Thor presses their foreheads together and wraps an arm around his brother's waist and Loki relaxes against him. They rest like that, rubbing each other's backs while they wait for their stomachs and nerves to settle.

Loki hooks his ankle behind Thor's knee and drags it forward over his own leg, then sandwiches it between his thighs. Thor lifts his chin and brushes their noses together, then tips his head and rests his lips against Loki's. They can feel the rush of air from each other's noses as it puffs against their mouths and tickles their chins.

Loki waits, because he needs to know Thor wants this. Wants him. He can't be the one to initiate everything.

Thor's head pushes forward slightly and the pressure spreads his lips against Loki's. Loki makes a tiny sound. Just a sigh. But it's so quiet in the room there's no missing it. Each press of their lips comes with soft wet sounds. Secret little things. Damp skin pressing against and peeling away from itself. Tongues stroking each other and swiping against lips. And their breaths come shorter and faster, filling their ears with an airy murmur.

It feels like their bodies are full of warm water. Their cocks are swollen between them, jumping with each press of lips. Thor runs his hand over the smooth skin on Loki's back. Lets his fingertips drag over his hip and down his leg. Loki pants. When Thor's hand cups the underside of his thigh and follows it up over the curve of his ass Loki hums and thrusts his hips and they both groan.

Thor grabs Loki's ass and heaves him closer and they sigh against each other's jaws.

They rock their hips and kiss distractedly, clasping each other tightly.

Loki's legs start to stiffen against Thor's and then he's keening and Thor can feel wetness soaking through the front of his pajamas.

“Turn around for me,” Thor whispers, and Loki rolls onto his other side.

Thor spoons up behind him and grabs Loki's hip, grinding against the meat of Loki's ass so he isn't rubbing Loki's cock while it's too sensitive. He comes a minute later, gasping and murmuring his brother's name against the bare skin before his face.

They lie there at the edge of sleep, breathless and boneless.

“Come on,” Thor sighs. “Let's get cleaned up.”

They stagger out of bed. Thor strips off his pajamas and throws them in a hamper and Loki finally gets to see Thor's body. He smiles at the sight. Thor's arms are enormous. Each muscle in his body is full. He looks ripe. Loki wants to put his mouth on every inch of that skin.

They wash their cocks in the sink. They're both too old to put up with the unpleasantness of having the tips of their pricks sealed shut by dry semen, feeling them stretch and sting when they try to piss through them in the morning. 

They weave themselves together again in bed, belly to belly. They kiss each other's faces and jaws, trace each other's bones with their fingertips, drift in and out of sleep until it finally sticks.

Thor wakes and sees his brother's unguarded face a few inches from his own. Muscles slack. Drool pooling on the pillow below his lips. Morning breath puffing against his cheeks. Skin smelling of musk and Thor's soap.

Thor's eyes drink it in for an hour before Loki wakes.

“G'morning,” Loki slurs, and wipes his mouth on the back of his hand.

“Good morning,” Thor says.

“C'mere," Loki mumbles, and Thor laughs and obliges him.

Loki tucks himself into the warmth of Thor's chest and Thor holds him there.

“I've spent the last five years living on deep tissue massages from a spa on my block,” Loki confesses.

“I got addicted to yoga because the way the instructor was always putting me into position with her hands made me think of you arranging me for portraits,” Thor says, and Loki sighs happily.

“Can you suck your own dick?” Loki asks.

“No,” Thor gripes, “And God knows I've tried.”

They dissolve into laughter.

They sleep for another hour and wake bright-eyed.

Loki pushes Thor onto his back and re-learns his brother's body, charting it with lips and fingers and the tip of his tongue. There's so much more of him now, Loki marvels. It's like Christmas. It's exactly what I wanted and it's still a surprise.

But Thor's cock is the same size, and his come tastes just like Loki remembers.

Thor eats Loki out before he sucks him off, and the swirl and swipe of Thor's tongue on the tender pink skin of his anus has Loki moaning so loudly the cat runs away.

They shower and Thor does a bit of work and then drives Loki to their parents' house to pick up his things and say his goodbyes. Thor has to wear a scarf and stay bundled up the whole time because Loki got too carried away to think straight and put a hickey on his throat. He'll buy some concealer at the drugstore later.

He takes Loki as far into the airport as he's allowed.

“See you soon,” Loki says, and kisses his cheek.

Thor smiles and watches until his brother is out of sight.

Now I'm awake, Thor tells himself. No more forgetting.

He's decided he's going to start calling his brother. Keeping tabs on him. Teasing Loki's sadness out over the phone - hunting him down and dragging it out of him if he has to. Binding him to life with promises. Because he needs his brother breathing, even if he's doing it far away. And he'll ask if he can visit. And they'll go out for coffee. And maybe they'll make love. And he'll get Loki laughing, and take him out in the sun. And Thor won't be greedy. Won't push. Won't forget that Loki's eyes see the world in ways that his never will, and that the inverse is probably true.

Loki has an ocean of tasks ahead of him in New York and he dives in because he's on a deadline.

He sends letters and finishes up projects. Let's everyone know the unexpected family issue that came up has been resolved. He contacts friends who asked favors long ago. Posts things to craigslist. Helps his landlady. Rents a car.

Thor slips back into his routine, working and reading and running.

He keeps up with his brother, calling and texting. Loki tells him his coworkers are glad to hear Thor is all right. That a get well soon card will be arriving from Diane Zimmerman - his landlady - and that he is willing to bet large sums of money that it will have a kitten on it. Loki ends his calls and texts with "I love you," and Thor does, too.

Thor drives to Pittsburgh to deliver the piece he made, since it's small enough for him to lift by himself. The woman who commissioned it insists that he stay for dinner, and she's charming, so he accepts.

When he gets back home he turns to hang his jacket on the door and swears when he finds a long wool coat already there. He stares for a minute and listens to the house, waiting to hear footsteps. He wishes he had a baseball bat and wonders if he should call 911 and run.

Snape didn't come to the door to greet him. He hopes whoever broke into his home didn't let his cat outside... or worse.

He looks at the coat again. It looks expensive.

He leans in to sniff it.

It smells like his brother.

Thor takes off his shoes and notices a pretty pair of black oxfords on the floor. He sees the spare keys he keeps at his parents' house on the counter.

Snape is at the top of the stairs when Thor gets there.

There's blue light glowing from the guest bedroom. Thor goes in and sees an open laptop and a filing cabinet that weren't there this morning. He opens the closet and finds that his summer clothes have been pushed slightly to one side to make way for someone else's summer wardrobe. The dresser drawers have received the same treatment.

He uses the bathroom and sees a second toothbrush in the cup on the sink. There's a damp towel hanging on the back of the door.

Loki is passed out in the middle of Thor's bed. Thor throws his clothes in the hamper and takes a shower. When he comes back, Loki is awake and playing with the cat.

Thor cocks an eyebrow.

“You couldn't say 'no'  if I didn't ask,” Loki explains, and Thor grins.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> please don't comment or repost.


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